Robin Williams Dies of Suspected Suicide

Courtesy Everett Collection

Robin Williams in "Good Will Hunting"

The Oscar-winning actor and comedian was 63.

Oscar-winning actor and comedian Robin Williams has died at age 63, according to police in Marin County, Calif.

The full statement is below.

On August 11, 2014, at approximately 11:55 a.m, Marin County Communications received a 9-1-1 telephone call reporting a male adult had been located unconscious and not breathing inside his residence in unincorporated Tiburon, CA. The Sheriff’s Office, as well as the Tiburon Fire Department and Southern Marin Fire Protection District were dispatched to the incident with emergency personnel arriving on scene at 12:00 pm. The male subject, pronounced deceased at 12:02 pm has been identified as Robin McLaurin Williams, a 63-year-old resident of unincorporated Tiburon, CA.

An investigation into the cause, manner, and circumstances of the death is currently underway by the Investigations and Coroner Division s of the Sheriff’s Office. Preliminary information developed during the investigation indicates Mr. Williams was last seen alive at his residence, where he resides with his wife, at approximately 10:00 pm on August 10, 2014. Mr. Williams was located this morning shortly before the 9-1-1 call was placed to Marin County Communications. At this time, the Sheriff’s Office Coroner Division suspects the death to be a suicide due to asphyxia, but a comprehensive investigation must be completed before a final determination is made. A forensic examination is currently scheduled for August 12, 2014 with subsequent toxicology testing to be conducted.

Williams' publicist Mara Buxbaum told The Hollywood Reporter: “Robin Williams passed away this morning. He has been battling severe depression of late. This is a tragic and sudden loss. The family respectfully asks for their privacy as they grieve during this very difficult time.”

His wife, Susan Schneider, said: "This morning, I lost my husband and my best friend, while the world lost one of its most beloved artists and beautiful human beings. I am utterly heartbroken. On behalf of Robin's family, we are asking for privacy during our time of profound grief. As he is remembered, it is our hope the focus will not be on Robin's death, but on the countless moments of joy and laughter he gave to millions.”

Williams, a four-time Oscar nominee, won a supporting actor Oscar for Good Will Hunting. He most recently starred in CBS' comedy The Crazy Ones, which lasted only one season.

He recently checked into a renewal center in an effort to maintain his sobriety.

Williams' improv skills were meteoric and stupefying: Williams could wing off the cuff better than any of his peers. He burst through the stand-up world into television, captivating audiences with his portrayal of the endearing extra-terrestrial Mork in the '70s series Mork and Mindy. He first limned the Mork role as a guest-star on Happy Days.

He fractured movies audiences with his comedic and endearing performance in Good Morning, Vietnam (1987). He delighted audiences in the box-office hit The Birdcage (1996), playing a gay club owner who tries to convince his conservative, future in-laws of his heterosexual mainstream values. He tapped into a fey side and feminine side, as well: He delighted with his slapstick values as a hausfrau in Mrs. Doubtfire (1993).

His rapid-fire delivery bespoke a warp-speed, associative intelligence.

“The mystery is in the motion: What miracle of the synapses got him from point A to point Z? At once a satirist, a comedian and a superb actor, this one-man repertory company dashes from mask to mask, voice to voice, like a man possessed by comic demons,” David Ansen wrote in Newsweek in 1986.

As a dramatic actor, he delivered stirring performances in such films as Dead Poets Society (1986), where he played an inspirational prep-school teacher who takes on the stuffy administration He also portrayed serious and complex characters in Awakenings (1990) andThe Fisher King (1991). He could tap into a dark side, limning psychologically maladjusted characters in Insomnia andOne-Hour Photo.

Williams also won Oscar nominations for Best Actor for his varied roles in Good Morning, Vietnam, The Fisher Kingand Dead Poets Society. He could play morose, wise men, such as his turn as a psychologist in Good Will Hunting.

He showed his versatility in a wide range of films, including: The World According to Garp (1982), Moscow on the Hudson (1984), Hook (1991), Patch Adams (1998) Flubber (1997), Toys (1992) and Jumanji (1995).

He won four Grammy Awards. He also won Emmy Awards for his TV specials Carol, Carl, Whoopi and Robin andABC Presents a Royal Gala.

He vocalized many films: He did the vocal work for a bat in the animated movie FernGully: The Last Rainforest (1982) and he voiced the Genie in Aladdin (1992).

Given his child-like charm, he played boy-ish characters in Toys (1992), Jumanji (1995) and Jack (1996).

He did a number of movie cameos: The Adventures of Baron Munchausen (1989), Dead Again (1991) and The Secret Agent (1996).

Robin McLaurin Williams was born in Chicago on July 21, 1952. He was raised in affluence, but he was brought up, as he admits, by the maid. He developed comedy to please his mother. He mimicked Jonathan Winters. The family moved to San Francisco where he graduated from high school.

He studied political science at Claremont Men's College and entered College of Marin to study theater. He won a scholarship to student at The Julliard School in New York, where he spent three years under the tutelage of John Houseman and other. He returned to San Francisco before graduating. His goal was to become a dramatic actor but could not get a foot in the door. He turned to stand-up comedy, supporting himself by tending bar and working at an ice-cream parlor.

Williams moved to Los Angeles and enthralled at open-mike nights. He became a regular at such clubs as the Improv and the Comedy Store. He got spots on such TV shows as the “Richard Pryor Show” and “America 2-Night.”

His big break came when the producers of “Happy Days” decided to add an alien to the show. Williams won an audition. He guest-starred on a 1978 episode that brought in avalanches of fan mail. Based on the outpouring the network decided to create a spin-off series “Mork & Mindy.” The sit-com, featuring Williams as a good-natured alien from the planet Ork. The show afforded him great opportunity to improvise. It was hugely popular and generated such crazes as the Mork doll, with such Orkian words as “nanu nanu” for hello.

Williams's spellbinding delivery vaulted him from being a complete unknown to national fame. Self-admittedly, fame arrived too fast and he careened through a period of drug and alcohol abuse. His first movie role in Robert Altman's “Popeye” (1980) was disappointing. In his second role, he showed his charm as a young writer in “The World According to Garp” (1982).

He performed in the mid 1980s in a series of mediocre movies: “”The Survivors” (1983), “The Best of Times” (1986) and “Club Paradise.” He excelled as a Russian saxophone player who defects in Bloomingdale's in Paul Mazursky's “Moscow on the Hudson” (1984).

He hit his movie stride with “Good Morning, Vietnam” (1987) where his comic versatility as an anti-authority G.I. Disc jockey played to his manic, improvisational strengths.

He executive produced and starred in “Jakob the Liar” (1999), a story of life in a Nazi-occupied Polish ghetto.

Like the best of comics, Williams, at heart, was utterly serious. He was a driving force in Comic Relief to benefit the homeless.

Williams was awarded the Chicago international Film Festival's Lifetime Achievement Award in 2004.

More recent film credits include: “Deconstructing Harry” (1997), “Patch Adams” (1988), “Bicentennial Man” (1999), “Death to Smoochy” (2002), “The Final Cut” (2004), “House of D” (2004), “The Big White” (2005), “Everyone's Hero” (2006), “Man of the Year” (2006), “Night at the Museum” (2006) and its sequel (2009), “License to Wed” (2007), “August Rush” (2007), “World's Greatest Dad” (2009), and “Happy Feet” (2006) and its sequel (2011) .

By Alicia Lutes

One thing is for certain: we're all very, very excited for AMC’s upcoming new series, Better Call Saul. Since the day the spin-off was announced, fans of Breaking Bad have positively lost their minds as they make their way through every interview, off-handed comment, and tweet, hoping to find answers to questions that drive TV fans crazy.

SPOILER ALERT: If you're not caught up with Breaking Bad, read on with caution! Some character and plot specifics are mentioned in the guide.

We know that can take an awfully long time to do! (Plus, most of you have jobs and lives, right?) So we’ve decided to compile everything we know about Better Call Saul, what speculative theories are out there, and what they’ve yet to decide as your new favorite TV series makes its long and winding way from concept to premiere date. Don't say we never did anything nice for ya!

Better Call Saul is a mostly comedic spin-off series of AMC’s insanely popular drama, Breaking Bad, starring ne’er-do-well but whip-smart lawyer to the worst of Albuquerque, Saul Goodman (a.k.a. Bob Odenkirk). It will center around Saul and feature the dark comedy he brought to the series. Being that Odenkirk is a comedian first, the show will likely marry both of his worlds.

When we left Saul at the end of Breaking Bad he was on the run, disappearing into a new life entirely, so nothing about Saul's future is certain, but his past is pretty clear and contained, and that's the focus of Better Call Saul, as the series is set up as more or less of a prequel to the Walter White era revealed to us in Breaking Bad. We met Saul Goodman on Breaking Bad when one of his many seedy advertisements inspired Jesse to call him for legal assistance. And from there, the rest is history, as Goodman's shady resourcefulness, connections and legal background proved particularly useful at times to Walter White. But how did he become the man Walter White met in the "Better Call Saul" episode? That's what this new series will reveal. Set six years before Saul Goodman met Walter White, Saul Goodman is going by the name Jimmy McGill, and he's described as "“a small-time lawyer searching for his destiny, and, more immediately, hustling to make ends meet.”

Though an exact premiere date for Better Call Saul hasn't been set, AMC originally confirmed that the series would premiere in November 2014, however that situation has changed. In addition to announcing that Season 2 was a go, AMC also announced the Better Call Saul's first season will air in 2015. The 13-episode Season 2 is expected to air in 2016.

Better Call Saul will air on AMC, duh. But there’s a caveat in that it will also appear on Netflix! Netflix and Breaking Bad producer Sony Pictures Television have “closed a deal for the spinoff series to be released through all of the streaming service’s territories.” But it won’t be simultaneous everywhere: in the U.S. and Canada, the complete first season of Better Call Saul won’t be available to Netflix members after its season finale on AMC.

While Breaking Bad creator Vince Gilligan will be involved, he will not be at the reigns this time. That’s a job for the creator of the Saul Goodman creator himself, writer/producer Peter Gould. Additionally, Emmy-nominated “Say My Name” writer, Tom Schnauz has also been confirmed to join the Better Call Saul team.

As it stands, there are two actors confirmed for Better Call Saul — Bob Odenkirk (natch), and Jonathan Banks, better known as his character, Mike Ehrmantraut. A very exciting prospect indeed, considering the prickly Ehrmantraut was basically the Olivia Pope of nefarious New Mexican deeds. Hopefully the series will also give us some more insight into who Mike was pre-Walter White.

Newcomers to the story include characters played by Patrick Fabian, Rhea Seehorn, Michael Mando and Michael McKean.

Other Breaking Bad actors seem to be chomping at the bit to return, including Krysten Ritter (as Jane, Jesse's girlfriend in Season 2). We asked Ritter if she'd be up for appearing in Better Call Saul when we spoke with her during the Veronica Mars junket and she told us,. "I would do it in a second. I love all of those people. I would do anything with any of them." But it doesn't sound like anyone's asked yet. And as Ritter herself pointed out, there might be an issue with Jane's path crossing with Saul's, since he was kind of involved in taking care of the situation when -- to put it vaguely for those who still aren't caught up on Breaking Bad -- Jane exited the series. But who's to say Saul would've remembered her if he did meet her in his past? Or if he did, that he would have pointed it out to anyone during Breaking Bad? Maybe there's a way to bring Jane into the story without drastically affecting her character's story (or Saul's awareness of her) in Breaking Bad. Just a bit of speculation, but for now, it doesn't sound like Ritter's been approached about being on the show.

One thing is for certain: Dean Norris (Hank) is out. Since joining the cast of CBS' Under the Dome, Norris has been quoted multiple times that he doesn't believe they'd let him do "a little cable show." So, there's that. He also said he's not a fan of "revisiting something that has already been done," but he's excited to see the show. We can probably rule out any appearances by Hank Schrader in Better Call Saul, at least in the near future.

And while there’s been talk — both from the actors and the rumor mill — that Aaron Paul and Bryan Cranston might reprise their roles on Better Call Saul, nothing’s been confirmed yet. But even Gilligan is into the idea, it seems, explaining to The Hollywood Reporter back in October that, “Personally, I'd have a hard time resisting putting all these guys in for a cameo or two every now and then. The sky's the limit with a prequel. Everybody who's now deceased in the Breaking Bad world is obviously still alive. You never know who might turn up and when and where.”

And let’s be real: boy oh boy would we love to see some more young Jesse Pinkman action. (As would Aaron Paul, it seems!) Last we heard, Paul had "serious talks" with Vince Gilligan about reprising his role in Better Call Saul.

This is where things are a bit vague still. According to Odenkirk, Better Call Saul will be “a mix of prequel and sequel” — at least that’s how it stood back in November. Prior to, the show was posited staunchly as a prequel series that ”will focus on the evolution of the Goodman character before he ever became Walter White’s lawyer.”

As it stands now — and as of January — Better Call Saul will largely be a prequel with fractured chronology. Check this excerpt:

We think, by and large, this show will be a prequel, but the wonderful thing about the fractured chronology we employed on Breaking Bad for many years is the audience will not be thrown by us jumping around in time. So it’s possible that we may indeed do that, and we’ll see the past and perhaps the future. Nothing is written in stone yet, we’re still figuring it out, but the thing we realize is tricky with the character is that Saul Goodman is very comfortable in his own skin. He seems to be a character who is pretty happy with himself, especially when we first meet him. He seems to be a pretty happy-go-lucky guy, and that makes him everything that Walter White is not. And that also makes for tricky drama. When I say drama, even in a comedy, you want drama, you want tension and conflict, and a character that at heart seems at peace with himself is intrinsically undramatic. [Laughs] So we’ve been thinking about how to address that issue.

Well, yes and yes. Technically speaking. According to creator Vince Gilligan, the biggest challenge for bringing Better Call Saul to life has been “to find the ongoing itch that Saul needs to scratch, so to speak, or else we wouldn’t have much of a show.” Which is why, it seems, the series has decided on a 75 percent comedy/25 percent drama ratio. The episodes will follow an hour-long format.

Better Call Saul Albuquerque, New Mexico, of course! At the offices of Saul Goodman. There’s been talk that we may also see a bit of courtroom drama, but nothing’s been confirmed yet, so best not to speculate on subject matter until we're closer to the whole thing coming together, don't you think?

Founder of the ‘Miami Sound,’ TK Records’ Henry Stone dies at 93

By Howard Cohen

hcohen@MiamiHerald.com

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'American Horror Story' Adds Patti LaBelle to 'Freak Show' Ranks

She'll appear in four episodes of the FX anthology

AP Images/Invision

Patti LaBelle

Patti LaBelle is bringing her "New Attitude" to FX's American Horror Story.

The Grammy Hall of Famer has booked a four-episode stint on the anthology series from Glee co-creators Ryan Murphy and Brad Falchuk, The Hollywood Reporter has confirmed.

Season four of the series, subtitled Freak Show, will focus on the last American freak show and be set in Jupiter, Fla., in the 1950s, with Jessica Lange in the lead role. The Emmy winner will portray a German expat managing one of the last remaining freak shows in the country. Returning stars set for Freak Show include Lange, Kathy Bates, Angela Bassett, Frances Conroy, Sarah Paulson, Gabourey Sidibe and Evan Peters, among others, as well as AHS newcomers Michael Chiklis, The Hunger Games' Wes Bentley, Fargo's John Carroll Lynch and The Normal Heart's Finn Wittrock. Chiklis is playing Bassett's husband and Bates' ex-husband.

As first reported by TV Line, LaBelle — who will not sing on the series — will play a local townie who begins to unravel the deadly secrets of Twisty the clown killer, the mother of Sidibe's character.

LaBelle becomes the second pop icon to appear on the series. Stevie Nicks guest-starred as herself in two episodes on Coven, the witchy third installment of American Horror Story.

LaBelle is repped by Resolution. AHS: Freak Show debuts in October; a specific date has not yet been announced.

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Friends and Fans React To Robin Williams' Death

Meriah DotyEditorAug 11, 2014

The official Sesame Street handle tweeted a photo of Williams laughing with the note: “We mourn the loss of our friend Robin Williams, who always made us laugh and smile.”

"Robin Williams made the world laugh & think," wrote Kevin Spacey. “I will remember & honor that. A great man, artist and friend. I will miss him beyond measure.”

Late night host Jimmy Kimmel chose to send a message to those who might need it along with his tribute to Williams, who died from an apparent suicide: “Robin was as sweet a man as he was funny. If you’re sad, please tell someone.”

Record producer Quincy Jones remembered Williams, writing, “RIP to my dear brother and friend Robin Williams. The world will miss the decades of laughter that you gave all of us.”

"I can’t believe the news about Robin Williams. He gave so much to so many people. I’m heartbroken," tweeted comedian and talk... DeGeneres.

"R.i.P Robin Williams.His genius as artist & comedian will B missed & his support of R troops no doubt was much appreciated by all who serve" tweeted Gary Sinise.

Depression drains your energy, hope, and drive, making it difficult to do what you need to feel better. But while overcoming depression isn’t quick or easy, it’s far from impossible. You can’t beat it through sheer willpower, but you do have some control—even if your depression is severe and stubbornly persistent. The key is to start small and build from there. Feeling better takes time, but you can get there if you make positive choices for yourself each day.

The road to depression recovery

Recovering from depression requires action, but taking action when you’re depressed is hard. In fact, just thinking about the things you should do to feel better, like going for a walk or spending time with friends, can be exhausting.

It’s the Catch-22 of depression recovery: The things that help the most are the things that are the most difficult to do. There’s a difference, however, between something that's difficult and something that's impossible.

Start small and stay focused

The key to depression recovery is to start with a few small goals and slowly build from there. Draw upon whatever resources you have. You may not have much energy, but you probably have enough to take a short walk around the block or pick up the phone to call a loved one.

Take things one day at a time and reward yourself for each accomplishment. The steps may seem small, but they’ll quickly add up. And for all the energy you put into your depression recovery, you’ll get back much more in return.

Depression self-help tip 1: Cultivate supportive relationships

Getting the support you need plays a big role in lifting the fog of depression and keeping it away. On your own, it can be difficult to maintain perspective and sustain the effort required to beat depression, but the very nature of depression makes it difficult to reach out for help. However, isolation and loneliness make depression even worse, so maintaining your close relationships and social activities are important.

The thought of reaching out to even close family members and friends can seem overwhelming. You may feel ashamed, too exhausted to talk, or guilty for neglecting the relationship. Remind yourself that this is the depression talking. Reaching out is not a sign of weakness and it won’t mean you’re a burden to others. Your loved ones care about you and want to help. And remember, it’s never too late to build new friendships and improve your support network.

• Turn to trusted friends and family members. Share what you’re going through with the people you love and trust, face to face if possible. The people you talk to don’t have to be able to fix you; they just need to be good listeners. Ask for the help and support you need. You may have retreated from your most treasured relationships, but they can get you through this tough time.
• Try to keep up with social activities even if you don’t feel like it. Often when you’re depressed, it feels more comfortable to retreat into your shell, but being around other people will make you feel less depressed.
• Join a support group for depression. Being with others dealing with depression can go a long way in reducing your sense of isolation. You can also encourage each other, give and receive advice on how to cope, and share your experiences.

Depression self-help tip 2: Challenge negative thinking

Depression puts a negative spin on everything, including the way you see yourself, the situations you encounter, and your expectations for the future.

But you can’t break out of this pessimistic mind frame by “just thinking positive.” Happy thoughts or wishful thinking won’t cut it. Rather, the trick is to replace negative thoughts with more balanced thoughts.

Ways to challenge negative thinking:

• Think outside yourself. Ask yourself if you’d say what you’re thinking about yourself to someone else. If not, stop being so hard on yourself. Think about less harsh statements that offer more realistic descriptions.
• Allow yourself to be less than perfect. Many depressed people are perfectionists, holding themselves to impossibly high standards and then beating themselves up when they fail to meet them. Battle this source of self-imposed stress by challenging your negative ways of thinking
• Socialize with positive people. Notice how people who always look on the bright side deal with challenges, even minor ones, like not being able to find a parking space. Then consider how you would react in the same situation. Even if you have to pretend, try to adopt their optimism and persistence in the face of difficulty.
• Keep a “negative thought log." Whenever you experience a negative thought, jot down the thought and what triggered it in a notebook. Review your log when you’re in a good mood. Consider if the negativity was truly warranted. Ask yourself if there’s another way to view the situation. For example, let’s say your boyfriend was short with you and you automatically assumed that the relationship was in trouble. It's possible, though, he’s just having a bad day.

Depression self-help tip 3: Take care of yourself

In order to overcome depression, you have to take care of yourself. This includes following a healthy lifestyle, learning to manage stress, setting limits on what you’re able to do, adopting healthy habits, and scheduling fun activities into your day.

• Aim for eight hours of sleep. Depression typically involves sleep problems. Whether you’re sleeping too little or too much, your mood suffers. Get on a better sleep schedule by learning healthy sleep habits.
• Expose yourself to a little sunlight every day. Lack of sunlight can make depression worse. Make sure you’re getting enough. Take a short walk outdoors, have your coffee outside, enjoy an al fresco meal, people-watch on a park bench, or sit out in the garden. Aim for at least 15 minutes of sunlight a day to boost your mood. If you live somewhere with little winter sunshine, try using a light therapy box.
• Keep stress in check. Not only does stress prolong and worsen depression, but it can also trigger it. Figure out all the things in your life that stress you out. Examples include: work overload, unsupportive relationships, taking on too much, or health problems. Once you’ve identified your stressors, you can make a plan to avoid them or minimize their impact.
• Practice relaxation techniques. A daily relaxation practice can help relieve symptoms of depression, reduce stress, and boost feelings of joy and well-being. Try yoga, deep breathing, progressive muscle relaxation, or meditation.
• Care for a pet. While nothing can replace the human connection, pets can bring joy and companionship into your life and help you feel less isolated. Caring for a pet can also get you outside of yourself and give you a sense of being needed—both powerful antidotes to depression.

Do things you enjoy (or used to)

While you can’t force yourself to have fun or experience pleasure, you can choose to do things that you used to enjoy. Pick up a former hobby or a sport you used to like. Express yourself creatively through music, art, or writing. Go out with friends. Take a day trip to a museum, the mountains, or the ballpark.

Push yourself to do things, even when you don’t feel like it. You might be surprised at how much better you feel once you’re out in the world. Even if your depression doesn’t lift immediately, you’ll gradually feel more upbeat and energetic as you make time for fun activities.

Depression self-help tip 4: Get regular exercise

When you’re depressed, exercising may be the last thing you feel like doing. But exercise is a powerful t...depression. In fact, studies show that regular exercise can be as effective as antidepressant medication at increasing energy levels and decreasing feelings of fatigue.

Scientists haven’t figured out exactly why exercise is such a potent antidepressant, but evidence suggests that physical activity triggers new cell growth in the brain, increases mood-enhancing neurotransmitters and endorphins, reduces stress, and relieves muscle tension—all things that can have a positive effect on depression.

To gain the most benefits, aim for 30 minutes of exercise per day. You can start small, though, as short 10-minute bursts of activity can have a positive effect on your mood. Here are a few easy ways to get moving:

• Take the stairs rather than the elevator
• Park your car in the farthest spot in the lot
• Take your dog for a walk
• Pair up with an exercise partner
• Walk while you’re talking on the phone

As a next step, try incorporating walks or some other enjoyable, easy form of exercise into your daily routine. The key is to pick an activity you enjoy, so you’re more likely to keep up with it.

Depression self-help tip 5: Eat a healthy, mood-boosting diet

What you eat has a direct impact on the way you feel. Aim for a balanced diet of low-fat protein, complex carbohydrates, fruits and vegetables. Reduce your intake of foods that can adversely affect your brain and mood, such as caffeine, alcohol, trans fats, saturated fats, and foods with high levels of chemical preservatives or hormones (such as certain meats).

• Don’t skip meals. Going too long between meals can make you feel irritable and tired, so aim to eat something at least every three to four hours.
• Minimize sugar and refined carbs. You may crave sugary snacks, baked goods, or comfort foods such as pasta or French fries, but these “feel-good” foods quickly lead to a crash in mood and energy.
• Focus on complex carbohydrates. Foods such as baked potatoes, whole-wheat pasta, oatmeal, and whole grain breads can boost serotonin levels without a crash.
• Boost your B vitamins. Deficiencies in B vitamins such as folic acid and B-12 can trigger depression. To get more, take a B-complex vitamin supplement or eat more citrus fruit, leafy greens, beans, chicken, and eggs.
• Try super-foods rich in nutrients that can boost mood, such as bananas (magnesium to decrease anxiety, vitamin B6 to promote alertness, tryptophan to boost feel-good serotonin levels), brown rice (serotonin, thiamine to support sociability), and spinach (magnesium, folate to reduce agitation and improve sleep).
• Consider taking a chromium supplement. Some depression studies show that chromium picolinate reduces carbohydrate cravings, eases mood swings, and boosts energy. Supplementing with chromium picolinate is especially effective for people who tend to overeat and oversleep when depressed.

Depression self-help tip 6: Know when to get additional help

If you find your depression getting worse and worse, seek professional help. Needing additional help doesn’t mean you’re weak. Sometimes the negative thinking in depression can make you feel like you’re a lost cause, but depression can be treated and you can feel better!

Don’t forget about these self-help tips, though. Even if you’re receiving professional help, these tips can be part of your treatment plan, speeding your recovery and preventing depression from returning.

The song was heavily inspired by the 1948 film Key Largo, which starred Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall, as is evident by the lyric: We had it all / Just like Bogie and Bacall / Starring in our own late late show / Sailing away to Key Largo. However, in the film Bogart and Bacall do not sail to Key Largo; Bogart arrives on a bus, and Bacall is already living there. The song also refers to the film Casablanca, with the lines "Here's looking at you, kid" and "Please say you will / Play it again". The song "Key Largo" was included on Higgins' album, Just Another Day in Paradise. The album's title track topped out at #46.

In 2009, VH1 ranked "Key Largo" #75 on its program 100 Greatest One Hit Wonders of the 80s.

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Lauren Bacall Dies at 89; in a Bygone Hollywood, She Purred Every Word

Lauren Bacall, the actress whose provocative glamour elevated her to stardom in Hollywood’s golden age and whose lasting mystique put her on a plateau in American culture that few stars reach, died on Tuesday in New York. She was 89.

Her death was confirmed by her son Stephen Bogart. “Her life speaks for itself,” Mr. Bogart said. “She lived a wonderful life, a magical life.”

With an insinuating pose and a seductive, throaty voice — her simplest remark sounded like a jungle mating call, one critic said — Ms. Bacall shot to fame in 1944 with her first movie, Howard Hawks’s adaptation of the Ernest Hemingway novel “To Have and Have Not,” playing opposite Humphrey Bogart, who became her lover on the set and later her husband.

It was a smashing debut sealed with a handful of lines now engraved in Hollywood history.

“You know you don’t have to act with me, Steve,” her character says to Bogart’s in the movie’s most memorable scene. “You don’t have to say anything, and you don’t have to do anything. Not a thing. Oh, maybe just whistle. You know how to whistle, don’t you, Steve? You just put your lips together and blow.”

Lauren Bacall had a long career in film and theater, but she remains best known for the roles she played opposite Humphrey Bogart.

The film was the first of more than 40 for Ms. Bacall, among them “The Big Sleep” and “Key Largo” with Bogart, “How to Marry a Millionaire” with Marilyn Monroe and Betty Grable, “Designing Woman” with Gregory Peck, the all-star “Murder on the Orient Express” (1974) and, later in her career, Lars von Trier’s “Dogville” (2003) and “Manderlay” (2005) and Robert Altman’s “Prêt-à-Porter” (1994).

But few if any of her movies had the impact of her first — or of that one scene. Indeed, her film career was a story of ups, downs and long periods of inactivity. Though she received an honorary Academy Award in 2009 “in recognition of her central place in the Golden Age of motion pictures,” she was not nominated for an Oscar until 1997.

The theater was kinder to her. She won Tonys for her starring roles in two musicals adapted from classic films: “Applause” (1970), based on “All About Eve,” and “Woman of the Year” (1981), based on the Spencer Tracy-Katharine Hepburn movie of the same name. Earlier she starred on Broadway in the comedies “Goodbye, Charlie” (1959) and “Cactus Flower” (1965).

She also won a National Book Award in 1980 for the first of her two autobiographies, “Lauren Bacall: By Myself.”

Though often called a legend, she did not care for the word. “It’s a title and category I am less than fond of,” she wrote in 1994 in “Now,” her second autobiography. “Aren’t legends dead?”

Forever Tied to Bogart

She also expressed impatience, especially in her later years, with the public’s continuing fascination with her romance with Bogart, even though she frequently said that their 12-year marriage was the happiest period of her life.

“I think I’ve damn well earned the right to be judged on my own,” she said in a 1970 interview with The...York Times. “It’s time I was allowed a life of my own, to be judged and thought of as a person, as me.”

Years later, however, she seemed resigned to being forever tied to Bogart and expressed annoyance that her later marriage to another leading actor, Jason Robards Jr., was often overlooked.

“My obit is going to be full of Bogart, I’m sure,” she told Vanity Fair magazine in a profile of her in March 2011, adding: “I’ll never know if that’s true. If that’s the way, that’s the way it is.”

Ms. Bacall was an 18-year-old model in New York when her face on the cover of Harper’s Bazaar caught the eye of Slim Hawks, Howard Hawks’s wife. Brought to Hollywood and taken under the Hawkses’ wing, she won the role in “To Have and Have Not,” loosely based on the novel of the same name.

She played Marie Browning, known as Slim, an American femme fatale who becomes romantically involved with Bogart’s jaded fishing-boat captain, Harry Morgan, known as Steve, in wartime Martinique. Her deep voice and the seductive way she looked at Bogart in the film attracted attention.

Their on-screen chemistry hadn’t come naturally, however. In one of the first scenes she filmed, she asked if anyone had a match. Bogart threw her a box of matches; she lit her cigarette and then threw the box back to him.

“My hand was shaking, my head was shaking, the cigarette was shaking, I was mortified,” she wrote in “By Myself.” “The harder I tried to stop, the more I shook. ... I realized that one way to hold my trembling head still was to keep it down, chin low, almost to my chest, and eyes up at Bogart. It worked and turned out to be the beginning of The Look.”

Ms. Bacall’s naturally low voice was further deepened in her early months in Hollywood. Hawks wanted her voice to remain low even during emotional scenes and suggested she find some quiet spot and read aloud. She drove to Mulholland Drive and began reading “The Robe,” making her voice lower and louder than usual.

“Who sat on mountaintops in cars reading books aloud to the canyons?” she later wrote. “I did.”

During her romance with Bogart, she asked him if it mattered to him that she was Jewish. His answer, she later wrote, was “Hell, no — what mattered to him was me, how I thought, how I felt, what kind of person I was, not my religion, he couldn’t care less — why did I even ask?”

An Impulsive Kiss

Ms. Bacall’s love affair with Bogart began with an impulsive kiss. While filming “To Have and Have Not,” he had stopped at her trailer to say good night when he suddenly leaned over, lifted her chin and kissed her. He was 25 years her senior and married at the time to Mayo Methot, his third wife, but to Ms. Bacall, “he was the man who meant everything in the world to me; I couldn’t believe my luck.”

As her fame grew in the ensuing months — she attracted wide publicity in February 1945 when she was photographed on top of a piano, legs draped over the side, with Vice President Harry S. Truman at the keyboard — so did the romance, particularly as she and Bogart filmed “The Big Sleep,” based on a Raymond Chandler whodunit.

But her happiness alternated with despair. Bogart returned to his wife several times before he accepted that the marriage could not be saved. He and Ms. Bacall were married on May 21, 1945, at Malabar Farm in Lucas, Ohio, the home of Bogart’s close friend the writer Louis Bromfield. Bogart was 45; Ms. Bacall was 20.

Returning to work, she soon suffered a setback, when the critics savaged her performance in “Confidential Agent,” a 1945 thriller with Charles Boyer set during the Spanish Civil War. The director was Herman Shumlin, who, unlike Hawks and Bogart on her first two movies, offered her no guidance. “I didn’t know what the hell I was doing,” she recalled. “I was a novice.”

“After ‘Confidential Agent,’ it took me years to prove that I was capable of doing anything at all worthwhile,” she wrote. “I would never reach the ‘To Have and Have Not’ heights again — on film, anyway — and it would take much clawing and scratching to pull myself even halfway back up that damn ladder.”

“Dark Passage,” her third movie with Bogart, came after several years of concentrating on her marriage. Had she not married Bogart, she told The Times in 1996, her career would probably have flourished, but she did not regret the marriage.

“I would not have had a better life, but a better career,” she said. “Howard Hawks was like a Svengali; he was molding me the way he wanted. I was his creation, and I would have had a great career had he been in control of it. But the minute Bogie was around, Hawks knew he couldn’t control me, so he sold my contract to Warner Bros. And that was the end.”

She was eventually suspended 12 times by the studio for rejecting scripts.

‘And We Made a Noise’

In 1947, as the House Un-American Activities Committee investigated Americans suspected of Communism, Ms. Bacall and Bogart were among 500 Hollywood personalities to sign a petition protesting what they called the committee’s attempt “to smear the motion picture industry.” Investigating individual political beliefs, the petition said, violated the basic principles of American democracy.

The couple flew to Washington as part of a group known as the Committee for the First Amendment, which also included Danny Kaye, John Garfield, Gene Kelly, John Huston, Ira Gershwin and Jane Wyatt. “I am an outraged and angry citizen who feels that my basic civil liberties are being taken away from me,” Bogart said in a statement.

Three decades later, Ms. Bacall would express doubts about “whether the trip to Washington ultimately helped anyone.” But, she added: “It helped those of us at the time who wanted to fight for what we thought was right and against what we knew was wrong. And we made a noise — in Hollywood, a community which should be courageous but which is surprisingly timid and easily intimidated.”

Nevertheless, bowing to studio pressure, Bogart later said publicly he believed the trip to Washington was “ill advised,” and Ms. Bacall went along with him.

A year after that trip she had what she termed “one of my happiest movie experiences” starring with Bogart, Lionel Barrymore, Edward G. Robinson and Claire Trevor in John Huston’s thriller “Key Largo.” It was Bogart’s and Ms. Bacall’s last film together. “Young Man With a Horn” (1950), with Kirk Douglas and Doris Day, in which she played a student married to a jazz trumpeter, was less successful.

Ms. Bacall’s first son, Stephen H. Bogart (named after Bogart’s character in “To Have and Have Not”), was born in 1949. A daughter, Leslie Bogart (named after the actor Leslie Howard), was born in 1952. In a 1995 memoir, Stephen wrote, “My mother was a lapsed Jew, and my father was a lapsed Episcopalian,” adding that he and his sister, Leslie, were raised Episcopalian “because my mother felt that would make life easier for Leslie and me during those post-World War II years.”

Rat Pack Den Mother

Ms. Bacall, however, wrote that she felt “totally Jewish and always would” and that it was Bogart who thought the children should be christened in an Episcopal church because “with discrimination still rampant in the world, it would give them one less hurdle to jump in life’s Olympics.”

She was, she said, happy being a wife and mother. She was also “den mother” to the so-called Hollywood Rat Pack, whose members included Bogart, Frank Sinatra, David Niven, Judy Garland and others. (It would evolve into the better-known Rat Pack whose members included Sinatra, Dean Martin and Sammy Davis Jr.)

In 1952 she campaigned for Adlai E. Stevenson, the Democratic candidate for president, and persuaded Bogart, who had originally supported the Republican Dwight D. Eisenhower, to join her. The two accompanied Stevenson on motorcades and flew east to help in the final lap of his campaign in New York and Chicago.

Her film career at this point appeared to be going nowhere, but she had no intention of allowing Lauren Bacall the actress to slide into oblivion. In 1953 her fortunes revived with what she called “the best part I’d had in years,” in “How to Marry a Millionaire,” playing alongside Marilyn Monroe and Betty Grable as New York models with sights set on finding rich husbands.

In the early 1950s the Bogarts dabbled in radio and the growing medium of television. They starred in the radio adventure series “Bold Venture” and, with Henry Fonda, in a live television version of “The Petrified Forest,” the 1936 film that starred Bogart, Bette Davis and Leslie Howard. In 1956 Ms. Bacall appeared in a television production of Noël Coward’s “Blithe Spirit,” in which Coward himself also starred. She would occasionally return to the small screen for the rest of her career, making guest appearances on shows like “The Rockford Files” and “Chicago Hope” and starring in TV movies.

Bogart was found to have cancer of the esophagus in 1956. Although an operation was successful — his esophagus and two lymph nodes were removed — after some months the cancer returned. He died in January 1957 at the age of 57.

Romance With Sinatra

Shortly after Bogart’s death, Ms. Bacall, by then 32, had a widely publicized but brief romance with Sinatra, who had been a close friend of the Bogarts. She moved to New York in 1958 and, three years later, married Mr. Robards, settling in a spacious apartment in the Dakota, on Central Park West, where she continued to live until her death. They had a son, the actor Sam Robards, and were divorced in 1969. She is survived by her sons, Stephen Bogart and Sam Robards; her daughter, Leslie Bogart; and six grandchildren.

Lauren Bacall was born Betty Joan Perske in Brooklyn on Sept. 16, 1924, the daughter of William and Natalie Perske, Jewish immigrants from Poland and Romania. Her parents were divorced when she was 6 years old, and her mother moved to Manhattan and adopted the second half of her maiden name, Weinstein-Bacal.

“I didn’t really have any love in my growing-up life, except for my mother and grandmother,” Ms. Bacall said in the Vanity Fair interview. Her father, she said, “did not treat my mother well.”

From then until her move to Hollywood, Ms. Bacall was known as Betty Bacal; she added an “l” to her name because, she said, the single “l” caused “too much irregularity of pronunciation.” The name Lauren was given her by Howard Hawks before the release of her first film, but family and old friends called her Betty throughout her life, and to Bogart she was always Baby.

Although finances were a problem as she was growing up — “Nothing came easy, everything was worked for” — her mother’s family was close-knit, and through an uncle’s generosity she attended the Highland Manor school for girls in Tarrytown, N.Y., where she graduated from grade school at 11. She went on to Julia Richman High School in Manhattan and also studied acting at the New York School of the Theater and ballet with Mikhail Mordkin, who had on occasion been Pavlova’s partner.

After graduation in 1940, Ms. Bacall became a full-time student at the American Academy of Dramatic Arts but left after the first year; her family could no longer subsidize her, and the academy at the time did not offer scholarships to women.

So she turned to modeling, and in 1941, at 16, she landed jobs with David Crystal, a Seventh Avenue dress manufacturer, and Sam Friedlander, who made evening gowns. During lunch hours she would stand outside Sardi’s selling copies of Actor’s Cue, a casting tip sheet, hoping to catch the attention of producers. She also became an usher at Broadway theaters and a hostess at the newly opened Stage Door Canteen.

Her first theater role was a walk-on in a Broadway play called “Johnny 2 x 4.” It paid $15 a week and closed in eight weeks, but she looked back on the experience as “magical.” Another stab at modeling, with the Walter Thornton agency, proved disappointing, but her morale soared in July 1942, with a sentence by George Jean Nathan in Esquire: “The prettiest theater usher — the tall slender blonde in the St. James Theater right aisle, during the Gilbert & Sullivan engagement — by general rapt agreement among the critics, but the bums are too dignified to admit it.”

Watching ‘Casablanca’

Later that year she was cast by the producer Max Gordon in “Franklin Street,” a comedy directed by George S. Kaufman, which closed out of town. It was her last time onstage for 17 years.

It was about this time that she saw Bogart in “Casablanca.” She later recalled that she could not understand the reaction of a friend who was “mad” about him. “So much for my judgment at that time,” she said.

In 1942, she met Nicolas de Gunzburg, an editor at Harper’s Bazaar, who took her to meet Diana Vreeland, the fashion editor. After a thorough inspection, Vreeland asked her to return the next day to meet the photographer Louise Dahl-Wolfe. Test shots were taken, and a few days later she was called.

A full-page color picture of her standing in front of a window with the words “American Red Cross Blood Donor Service” on it led to inquiries from David O. Selznick, Howard Hughes and Howard Hawks, among others. The Hawks offer was accepted, and Betty Bacall, 18 years old, left for the West Coast by train with her mother. She returned to New York less than two years later as Lauren Bacall, star.

In her 70s, Ms. Bacall began lending her distinctive voice to television commercials and cartoons, and her movie career again picked up steam. Between 1995 and 2012 she was featured in more than a dozen pictures, most notably “The Mirror Has Two Faces” (1996), in which she played Barbra Streisand’s monstrous, vain mother.

The role brought her an Academy Award nomination as best supporting actress; the smart money was on her to win. But the Oscar went to Juliette Binoche for her part in “The English Patient,” to the astonishment of almost everyone, including Ms. Binoche.

Ms. Bacall — who received a consolation prize of sorts when she was named a Kennedy Center Honors winner a few months later — was perhaps prepared for the Oscar rebuff. Shortly before the Academy Awards ceremony, she told an interviewer that she hadn’t been happy for years. “Contented, yes; pleased and proud, yes. But happy, no.”

Still, she said, she had been lucky: “I had one great marriage, I have three great children and four grandchildren. I am still alive. I still can function. I still can work.”

As she said in 1996: “You just learn to cope with whatever you have to cope with. I spent my childhood in New York, riding on subways and buses. And you know what you learn if you’re a New Yorker? The world doesn’t owe you a damn thing.”

StarTrek.com is saddened to report the passing of Arlene Martel, who died on August 12 following a heart attack. The veteran television and film actress had a career that spanned parts of seven decades, dating back to the golden age of television, but she was arguably best known for her role as T'Pring in the "Amok Time" episode of Star Trek: The Original Series.

The character -- Spock's betrothed, whom she spurns -- was a sexy, exotic presence in the episode, the first and only episode set on Vulcan. Martel had previously auditioned for roles in the episodes "Where No Man Has Gone Before" and "Catspaw."

Martel's other credits included the popular Outer Limits episode "Demon with a Glass Hand" (written by Harlan Ellison), the "Twenty-Two" episode of The Twilight Zone, Hogan's Heroes, My Favorite Martian, Bewitched, Columbo, Battlestar Galactica, Knot's Landing, A Walk to Remember, Brothers & Sisters, and Star Trek: Of Gods and Men.

Talking to StarTrek.com in 2010, Martel spoke fondly of her brief but important visit to the Star Trek universe and noted the enduring popularity of "Amok Time," which remains a fan favorite. "It does hold up," she said. "If it didn’t, they wouldn’t re-run it as much as they do. I just saw it a couple of weeks ago. It’s re-run almost more than any other episode, and it seems to be so popular because of the mating issue.

To see a Vulcan in the heat of his sexuality is a very interesting thing. It’s interesting to see anyone in that situation, if the story is good, but to see someone who’s usually so repressed going through it, I think that captured people’s imaginations. I think that’s the fascination about it. And then to see how this woman deals with that, and the decisions and choices she makes."

"My performance, I think, holds up quite well, especially visually," she continued. "I didn’t have that much to say, but I think you see me and my reactions, and my presence is felt. Looking at it, I can see why they cast me in that role."

Martel, who was also a regular on the convention and autograph show circuit, was either 78 or 80 years old depending on the source. StarTrek.com offers our condolences to her family, friends and many fans.

Thandie Newton Boards HBO's 'Westworld'

The drama pilot stars Anthony Hopkins and counts J.J. Abrams, Jonathan Nolan and Jerry Weintraub among its producers

AP Images/Invision

Thandie Newton

HBO's Westworld adaptation continues to flush out its stellar cast.

Rogue star Thandie Newton has boarded the premium cable network's adaptation of the sci-fi hit, The Hollywood Reporter has learned.

Inspired by Michael Crichton's 1973 feature film, the drama is billed as a dark odyssey about the dawn of artificial consciousness and the future of sin.

Newton (Crash) will play Maeve Millay, a beautiful and razor-sharp woman with a genius for reading people and a knack for survival. Maeve is the Westworld madame whose seen-it-all-before worldview is about to be truly challenged.

She joins a cast that includes Anthony Hopkins, Evan Rachel Wood,Ed Harris, Jeffrey Wright, Rodrigo Santoro, Shannon Woodward, James Marsden, Kyle Bornheimer and more. Production on the pilot begins this month.

J.J. Abrams will executive produce alongside veteran producer Jerry Weintraub and Bad Robot's Bryan Burk. Person of Interest's Jonathan Nolan, who co-wrote the pilot, will executive produce and direct as well. Lisa Joy co-created the drama and co-wrote the pilot and will also exec produce. Kathy Lingg will co-executive produce and Athena Wickham is a producer on the Warner Bros. Television drama. David Coatsworth is set as a co-executive producer and line producer, with Susie Ekins set as a co-producer.

The news comes a day after satellite TV provider DirecTV renewed its original cop drama Rogue for a supersized third season of 20 episodes — with production starting in January on the first 10 to air in spring 2015 and the second half in 2016. It's unclear how Newton, who is the singular lead on the series, would juggle both should Westworld earn a likely series order.

Newton is repped by WME, Untitled and Independent Group in the U.K.

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'The Leftovers' Renewed for Second Season at HBO

Damon Lindelof's drama will be back for a second run next year

Paul Schiraldi/HBO

The Leftovers

HBO has ordered a second helping of The Leftovers.

The premium cable network announced Wednesday that it has renewed the Damon Lindelof drama for a second season.

"We are thrilled to bring back The Leftovers for a second season with the exceptional talents of Damon Lindelof and Tom Perrotta,” HBO programming president Michael Lombardo said. “It has been truly exciting to see the overwhelming response to their provocative and original storytelling. We look forward to continuing the journey as the show delves deeper into the lives of those who remain.”

The drama, based on Perrotta's best-seller and starring Justin Theroux, enjoyed a solid (if not altogether exciting) premiere audience in June when it opened to 1.7 million viewers. That figure put it nearly half a million south of HBO's previous drama debut, True Detective, from January. But as is the case with most HBO shows, the series has been reaping its biggest ratings from time-shifting, encores and streams on the HBO Go app. The series has surged to nearly 8 million weekly viewers once all platforms are taken into account.

The Leftovers hails from Warner Bros. Television, HBO's first outside studio buy. The cabler, which typically owns all its original programming, is also developing another pilot from WBTV (Westworld) as well as one from 20th Century Fox Television (Ryan Murphy's Open).

HBO originally picked up the rights to The Leftovers in 2011 after Lindelof read the book and tracked the rights back to the network. After signing an overall deal with WBTV, he met with Perrotta and started talking about what a series take would look like.

For HBO, The Leftovers comes as the cabler is poised to say farewell to three dramas. True Blood, The Newsroom and Boardwalk Empire will all end their respective runs with their upcoming seasons. Meanwhile, megahit Game of Thrones has already been locked up for seasons five and six as HBO prepares a second season of anthology True Detective as well as new comedies including The Comeback, Ballers and The Brink, among returning fare Silicon Valley, Getting On, Girls, Veep and more.

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Sara Bareilles Dedicates Song to Robin Williams, Puts on 'Brave' Face at the Greek: Concert Review

9:28 PM PDT 8/12/2014 by Chris Willman

Kyleen James

The Bottom Line

Bareilles addresses depression from a Los Angeles stage, even as her own ascendency to stardom provides one less reason to have the blues about the state of pop music

Venue

Greek Theater
Los Angeles
(Monday, August 11)

Anyone feeling soul-sick at the end of a day spent mulling Robin Williams’ suicide couldn’t have found a more balm-like gig to end up at than Sara Bareilles’ show Monday night at the Greek. Bareilles seemed as likely as any performer could to at least acknowledge the tragedy, since her catalog has its share of cloudy moments. Just as you would’ve hoped, the singer found an appropriate moment to invoke what was weighing on everyone’s minds, dedicating “Hercules” — a song that sprang out of her own most depressed period — to Williams’ family.

“This is my darkest hour,” she sang, in the middle of what was unmistakably her show’s darkest four and a half minutes. Even if she’d skipped that dedication, though, the Greek still would have been the optimal landing point for any melancholics on Monday, since her current tour is about as close as you’re going to get to a secular healing service.

Bareilles’ most recent album, 2013’s The Blessed Unrest, included its share of downbeat moments but also found the performer trying on a new role, as a singer of outrightly inspirational anthems, several of which were cornerstones of Monday’s show. When The Blessed Unrest first came out, I confess, I found “Brave” and “I Wanna Be Like Me” to be a little too message-y for their own good, and a cut below her more confessional material. But having seen how “Brave” has taken on a life of its own over the past year as a real flag-waver for underdog causes, I’m far less inclined to devalue it. By the time she ended the main part of her set with it Monday, it felt like the gospel song we all needed to hear.

The singer was exhibiting a bit of courage herself, just by playing L.A. the night after Paul McCartney put on a superior stadium show that was probably attended by a good chunk of her sold-out amphitheater audience. Bareilles is not going to fill his Beatle-boots, but if you go for that kind of classicism, you won’t find any pop performer under 40 who better exemplifies the full-package tradition: phenomenal voice, serious multi-instrumental chops, and the ability to write what sound like instant standards. She also swears like a sailor on stage, with a feisty sense of humor that probably puts her closer to Billy Joel’s camp, as profanely funny classic-rock storytellers go. (“As much as I like you telling us how good we are, shut the f— up,” went one characteristic remark, setting up an a cappella closer.)

Last year at this time, it wasn’t altogether clear that she could have headlined the Greek, and so she passed through the same house on a co-headlining tour with One Republic that effectively had her playing second banana to a less accomplished act. Yet, somehow, “Brave” had its weird life — coming out and more or less stiffing as a single, then getting a minor run of attention because of the Katy Perry/”Roar” similarities, then finally becoming ubiquitous on its own merits. And here she was back, filling the back rows without Ryan Tedder and company as a failsafe, seeming as if to the amphitheater manner born, which is an odd place to wind up for someone who spent so much of her life behind a baby grand.

As superb as Bareilles can be in her Laura Nyro/Carole King mode, it’s a little surprising — and maybe disconcerting, but only for a minute — to see how good she is at being a modern pop star, too. For much of her current show, she’s either standing up at the piano or abandoning it to work the crowd across the lip of the stage. The slightly tomboyish hat of her erstwhile trademark persona is gone, replaced by a glam look that includes the “Little Black Dress” named in the opening number — albeit a little black leather number. She’s gifted enough to have it both ways, moving from a solo ballad, “Manhattan,” that sounds like it could have been lifted right out of the Great American Songbook, into as electronically enhanced a dance-off as “Eden.”

She explained one transition in thinking in introducing one of the newer songs. A fan from Boston, she said, had told her that he’d wanted to include a song of hers in his wedding but they couldn’t because the material was all too depressing. “You’re not wrong,” she claimed she told him, “but f— you, anyway.” Bareilles’ true response was to cave and write “I Choose You,” a wedding song if ever there was one. You could call it a sell-out, or just an affirmation that, just like the cancer victims and sexually closeted types she alludes to in her other anthems, lovebirds need to be brave, too.

Real musical courage came in again after the encore call. A white sheet draped off the instruments as Bareilles emerged with the three female members of her band (who otherwise played violin, cello, and electronic keyboards) joining her for sublime a cappella four-part harmonies… a format possibly inspired by the season she spent judging The Sing-Off? The song was “Bright Lights and Cityscapes,” and the theme was staking a claim in a romantic triangle for being the better other woman. That’s a claim that’s hard to deny, in the pop sphere right now, if nowhere else.

The most YouTube-able moment of this tour is a new song called “She Used to Be Mine” — unreleased because it was written for a Broadway show she’s working on, an adaptation of the 2007 film Waitress. The ballad sure sounded like a future Tony Awards performance moment, leaving you to imagine that the biggest challenge the show’s producers face is finding a theater actress who can sing Bareilles’ material with as much heart, soul, and even belting power as she does. Let’s hope the tribulations of getting a Broadway musical mounted don’t lead to a new round of depression for Bareilles to write about.

Set List:

Little Black Dress
I Wanna Be Like Me
Love On The Rocks
Love Song
Hercules
Come Round Soon
Manhattan
She Used to Be Mine
Chandelier
Gravity
Gonna Get Over You
Chasing The Sun
I Choose You
Eden
King Of Anything
Brave

Encore:

Bright Lights and Cityscapes
Satellite Call

Twitter: @chriswillman

Kyleen James

Did the California Labor Commissioner Just Shake Up the Music Industry?

A new ruling holds that deals between producers and artists aren't exempted by the Talent Agencies Act

Courtesy of Big Hassle Media

Every so often, California's requirement that talent agents be licensed mucks up relationships in the entertainment industry. On Monday, the California Labor Commissioner promulgated a decision that has the potential to be a huge disrupter in the music business, changing how artists, producers and record labels co-exist with each other.

The dispute involves a record producer named Steve Lindsay, who has done work for the band Guster and the trumpeter Chris Botti, and allegedly owed money to his former personal management firm, the Marie Management Group (MMG).

After the firm sought to collect money from Lindsay, the California Labor Commissioner held a hearing about whether agreements set up for Lindsay violated the Talent Agencies Act, a statute adopted by the California legislature in 1978, which says only licensed talent agents can procure employment for clients.

There's a great exception to this rule, however.

Up until now, the TAA hasn't had as much an impact in the music business as other sectors in entertainment thanks to an exemption set up in 1982 for the procurement of recording contracts.

But what happens if a manager sets up a deal between a recording artist and producer? The exemption applies, right? No, says the Labor Commissioner in its newest ruling.

When Lindsay was being represented by MMG, he was being handled by Bennett Kaufman, who lined up opportunities for Lindsay to produce albums. Notably, when Lindsay did work for Guster, the producer and band formed a direct contractual relationship with each other. The record company, Sire Records, was not a party to this contract. The same was true on the contract that governed Lindsay's work for Botti. Sony Music wasn't a part of that deal either.

So what?

MMG argued that the contracts were connected to the production of recordings, and so, the exemption applied. To hold otherwise, MMG argued, would "send shockwaves through the industry and disturb long-held, highly developed rules and territory between managers and agents, not to mention a flurry of new claims by artists or non-artists involved in a recording contract."

The Labor Commissioner isn't buying that argument. From the decision (which can be read here):

"Because based on limited legislative history it appears the intent of the recording contract exemption was to exempt the act of negotiating recording contracts between artists and the recording companies. Here the Guster and Botti agreements are agreements made directly between a producer and the artist. In short, the record company is not a party to these contracts. These contracts are essentially contracts between two artists for services. And consequently, we choose not to expand the purview of the Act's exemption to encompass contracts for personal services between artists and producer/artists."

This violation of the TAA was determined to be so significant that the Labor Commissioner decided to void the entire personal management agreement between Lindsay and MMG. This is significant because MMG likely wanted most of all to collect a percentage of the sale of Lindsay's jointly-operated publishing company. That was part of the overall dispute, but the Labor Commissioner finds that MMG's securing of a publishing agreement for Lindsay was akin to getting him involved in a co-venture or partnership -- outside of the scope of the TAA. In other words, if it wasn't for the Guster and Botti deals, MMG would be owed money, but the Labor Commissioner rules against severing those engagements.

Here are the ramifications in English: Record producers and artists can't simply contract with each other. At least, not if managers want to securely collect their commissions. There's going to have to be changes to the dynamic. Perhaps record labels become a party to the deals. Or maybe producers work for the labels instead of providing services directly to the artist. Time will tell. Bryan Freedman, who along with Steve Stiglitz at Freedman & Taitelman represented Lindsay, calls the ruling a "game-changer for the music industry."

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Paul McCartney at Dodger Stadium: Concert Review

Associated Press

The Bottom Line

Pop music’s favorite lefty returned to L.A.’s baseball stadium 48 years after the Beatles headlined the venue, with a faultless, nearly three-hour extravaganza that had 50,000 fans sipping on the fountain of youth to wash down their Dodger dogs.

Venue

Dodger Stadium,
Los Angeles
(Sunday, Aug. 10)

Pop music’s favorite lefty returns to L.A.'s baseball stadium 48 years after the Beatles headlined the venue

The years have certainly taken their toll on Paul McCartney. Due to the unavoidable levies that are endemic to the aging process, Sir Paul now looks about 53 and sounds maybe 40 — which is to say that anyone who walked into Dodger Stadium on Sunday nervous that their hero might not be able to deliver the kind of show he always has, left reassured that 72 is the new middle age after all. Those Dodger dogs were tasty, but in watching the literally and figuratively paunch-less McCartney cut such a fountain-of-youthful figure for 2 hours and 45 minutes, more than a few of us were considering a late-inning conversion to veganism.

In the lead-up to the show, McCartney joked about how he’d be performing a longer set this time than he did during his last appearance at the venue, when the Beatles played one of their patented half-hour sets at the close of their touring career in 1966. The curious thing is that McCartney has really only started doing nearly three-hour sets in the last decade, as opposed to Bruce Springsteen, who has the legendarily epic shows of his youth to live up to. Although some confidantes over the years have claimed that there’s an opacity to McCartney’s personality, anyone looking at these setlists would have to assume some kind of generosity of spirit at work there, or that, at worst, dude is just a people-pleaser nonpareil. Whatever’s motivating him at this stage — largess? legacy-building? — each night really is a loooong and winding road, albeit never quite long enough.

That eagerness to please extends to both casual comers and cultists. Hardcore fans who’ve seen McCartney on his five previous world tours will use the playing of staples like “Let It Be” and “Hey Jude” as the occasion for a power nap. (“Live and Let Die,” maybe too, except that the traditional booming fireworks display precludes that.) There are other rewards for your years of service as a severe Beatlemaniac, however. Among the encores, “Hi, Hi, Hi” is making its first appearance on a McCartney tour since the Wings Over America trek in 1975 — and not a moment too soon for lovers of polygons and bananas as sexual metaphors, or just anyone who loves a rousing closer.

More notably, he’s picked out three Beatles songs that he never performed on tour before: the long-overdue “Lovely Rita,” “All Together Now” (described as one “for the kids,” with background animation featuring minion-like critters) and “Being for the Benefit of Mr. Kite!” That last pick is a slightly controversial one, since John Lennon sang the psychedelic circus reverie on Sgt. Pepper and had always seemed to take sole credit for its writing before McCartney recently declared that he’d had a hand in it, too. But hearing our man handle its famously complicated Hofner bass line and tackle its vocal for the first time in history was itself worth the $250 top ticket price, if you’re that kind of fan.

Other Fab-related material was making an encore on this tour, like the inevitable reading of McCartney's posthumous Lennon salute, “Here Today,” and his now familiar ukulele-driven reading of George Harrison’s “Something.” On the other hand, when McCartney switched from bass to lead guitar for “Paperback Writer” and announced that he was playing the same Epiphone Casino he’d played on the original recording, you could suppose that maybe he wanted to grab back a little of the props that are usually falsely afforded to Harrison for the riffing on that single, just as he was claiming that “Mr. Kite” co-writing credit. There’s no doubt that McCartney is a guitar hero when he wants to be, and he proved it by tagging on about a minute’s worth of shredding on Jimi Hendrix’s “Foxy Lady” onto “Let Me Roll It,” his other major six-string showcase.

The star also spent a considerable amount of time behind pianos — first a grand, then a smaller one at center stage whose color design looked right out of Peter Max or Pepperland. Between “Nineteen Hundred and Eighty-Five” and “Lady Madonna,” you could almost make the case that all the years McCartney spent on bass or guitar were wasted when he really should have been redoubling his efforts on being the funkiest rock pianist alive (or at least tied with Elton John for those honors).

Less spectacularly syncopated, but no less an ebony-and-ivory highlight, was “Maybe I’m Amazed.” It was here, of all places, where you might expect to find a man of McCartney’s vintage protecting his voice on tour. But while this wasn’t necessarily the most ecstatic reading he’s ever given of his Linda-themed debut solo ballad, there was no sense of his holding back from the romantic howls that drive the tune to its climax. McCartney staked his initial claim in the Beatles as the guy who brought the vocal Little Richard influence to genteel Brit-pop, and eventually, as it turned out, he managed to answer the musical question, “What if Little Richard were a sensitive ballad singer?” That was the unlikely combination he brought — and still brings — to the fore in “Amazed.” It was his ability to be both our Sinatra and our Elvis that made him the finest all-around pop star of the 20th century, and still arguably the only singer alive today whose demographic can’t be narrowed down much beyond “the Western world.”

That said, he’s silly…not so much with the love songs nowadays, but with lots of silly stage commentary. McCartney can hardly seem to end a song without following it up with a little bit of ridiculous dancing, as if to suggest the song is still going on his or our heads. “And I Love Her,” of all the songs, even found him turning around and doing a very slight twerk for the multistory video screens, as guitarist Rusty Anderson did a no-doubt practiced eye roll. Although he’s usually not this spontaneous on stage, McCartney invited up a woman whose daughter had been holding up a sign reading “Will you be my mom’s only tattoo?” and obliged her with an autograph on her forearm. Then, in his workmanlike way, hustled them offstage when the daughter seemed to want an extra favor. Without seeming too sentimental, he made just enough references to the Beatles’ previous appearances at the stadium: “There’s a few people here in the audience who were here in 1966. Come on, girls, let’s hear the screams.”

Screaming seems to have taken a remarkably minor toll on McCartney’s own voice. Serious audiologists who believed they heard the signs of pitch correction on his 2009 live album may have been looking for it here, but the occasional strained note that may have alarmed those listening for signs of aging was probably ironically a relief to anyone worried that he’s gone all Auto-Tune on us. And it was hard to find too many notes, much less full verses, where anything had been dialed down to adjust for lowered vocal expectations. Maybe it’s also worth noting that while McCartney sat on a stool when he sang “I’ve Just Seen a Face” in ’75, he now performs the acoustic segments while standing, again presenting a very convincing case for keeping Linda’s veggie cookbooks in print.

Under the supermoon, Angelenos got their supermacca. Not to put too celestial a point on it, but, watching McCartney pay homage to Lennon and Harrison, it was easy to remember how those premature deaths made some devotees question the very heavens. But seeing McCartney still able, at an improbable 72, to give 50,000 fans the Beatle-esque concert of their dreams, a fan could easily leap to the conclusion that somebody up there likes us.

Setlist:

Eight Days a Week
Save Us
All My Loving
Listen to What the Man Said
Let Me Roll It/Foxy Lady
Paperback Writer
My Valentine
Nineteen Hundred and Eighty-Five
The Long and Winding Road
Maybe I'm Amazed
I've Just Seen a Face
We Can Work It Out
Another Day
And I Love Her
Blackbird
Here Today
New
Queenie Eye
Lady Madonna
All Together Now
Lovely Rita
Everybody Out There
Eleanor Rigby
Being for the Benefit of Mr. Kite!
Something
Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da
Band on the Run
Back in the U.S.S.R.
Let It Be
Live and Let Die
Hey Jude

Encore 1:

Day Tripper
Hi, Hi, Hi
I Saw Her Standing There

Encore 2:

Yesterday
Helter Skelter
Golden Slumbers
Carry That Weight
The End

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Lynyrd Skynyrd to Be Honored at Star-Studded Concert Event

Associated Press

"One More for the Fans!" will feature performances from the legendary rock group and their famous friends

The music and legacy of Lynyrd Skynyrd will be honored this fall during a nightlong concert event titled "One More for the Fans! – Celebrating the Songs & Music of Lynyrd Skynyrd." The star-studded ceremony will be held Nov. 12 at Atlanta's Fox Theatre and feature performances from the group and many guest stars.

Among the initial lineup of confirmed performers are Trace Adkins, Alabama, Gregg Allman, Charlie Daniels, Peter Frampton, Warren Haynes, John Hiatt, Jason Isbell, Jamey Johnson, Aaron Lewis, moe., Govt Mule, Robert Randolph, Blackberry Smoke, Cheap Trick and Donnie Van Zant; in other words, expect an unbelievable performance of "Free Bird" at some point. Surprise guests and additional performers are also forthcoming.

The Fox Theatre holds a special place in Lynyrd Skynyrd lore: The group recorded a live album, One More From the Road, at the venue in 1976 in an effort to save the theater from demolition. Producer Don Was will serve as music director of the event, with Ken Levitan and Ross Schilling as executive producers and Keith Wortman as creator and executive producer.

"Lynyrd Skynyrd’s music has had a profound and unmistakable influence on artists and fans all over the world," says Was in a statement. Wortman adds, "This incredible initial lineup of artists coming together to celebrate this band and their music is a genuine reflection of that. I am honored to produce a multi-media event of this magnitude."

"One More for the Fans!" will be filmed and recorded for "multiplatform distribution," according to a press release. Tickets for the event go on sale to the public Aug. 18 at 10:00 a.m. at www.foxtheatre.org.

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'American Idol' Champ Kris Allen Discusses New Album 'Horizons,' Remembers Michael Johns

By Michele Amabile Angermiller, The Hollywood Reporter | August 13, 2014 5:05 AM EDT

Kris Allen Eric Ogden

It’s less than a week before the release date of his new album, Horizons, and American Idol season eight winner Kris Allen is like a kid on Christmas Eve.

The 29-year old singer had just released a live stream of the collection on YouTube, and stayed up into the wee hours reading fan reaction on the Internet. While he excitedly waited to see which songs were emerging as fan favorites, he was most amused by one question about who the mysterious vocalist on one song was hitting an extraordinarily low note.

“It was me, singing,” he laughed. “I was sitting there on Twitter before going to bed and watching people’s comments and that meant the world, you know?”

Horizons is Allen’s third release since winning Idol in 2009, and the first one he's putting out independently -- on his Dogbear Records. While he admits that going out on his own as his own CEO, and being in charge of hiring promotions and distribution people, is a challenge, he feels like he has a lot more control in “calling the shots.”

Says Allen: “It’s a lot more work, but because of that I have more ownership than before," he said.

The Aug. 12 release of Horizons promises to be a fulfilling moment for a man who survived a car crash last year. During the head-on collision, Allen’s wrist was broken and as he recovered, he had to re-learn the way he approached making music. The result can be heard throughout Horizons, particularly in his new finger-picking style of guitar playing, which is prominent in the final mixes.

“I’ve been playing with my fingers a lot more because of my wrist,” he tells The Hollywood Reporter. “It’s a different way to play and some of those songs were written when my hand was in a cast so all I had was my fingers. I think it made me a bit more melodic than just strumming a bunch of chords.”

The first song he wrote in that style, “Beautiful & Wild,” was inspired by impending fatherhood (he's now dad to one-year old son, Oliver). “He wasn’t even born yet, but it was one of those songs where the lyrics just kind of floated into my head," says Allen.

Once songs started flowing, Allen reached out to Civil Wars and Switchfoot producer Charlie Peacock and was surprised to get an immediate response. As Allen recalls: “We met on a Sunday in Nashville, went over to his place… we didn’t even play any music; We just talked about life and what I wanted to do with this record. I think we both knew this was going to be a good thing.”

Peacock's goal with the album was to bring Allen's voice and his evolving guitar style to the forefront, something that he felt was hidden in his previous rock releases. Allen also adds that his songwriting skills got sharper.

"When I started songwriting I was terrible — so bad," says the Arkansas native. "It wasn’t the thing I was really good at and I would like to think that now I can hold my own. I know how to craft a song and be true to myself and not be afraid to say things. It’s been a process and I feel like I got closer on the second record and figured out some things."

Allen says that Peacock also brought something else to the table: “amazing musicians” such as Russian vocalist Lenachka, who is featured on the intimate single, “Prove It To You.”

“She is just an incredible singer and I love her vibe,” he says. “I think we sang this song three times and then we were done. It’s a really simple song. There’s not a lot to it and she came in and made it a hundred times better. “

Peacock served as a good sounding board for Allen, who at first toyed with keeping the song “Young Love (Paul Simon)” as a performance-only piece. “I’m a little ADD when it comes to songs,” he explains. “I had this song for a little bit and played it a bunch live, and Charlie wanted to record it. And it was cool because it’s different than most songs. It doesn’t have any structure whatsoever. It’s a really great introduction for the record."

Other songs sure to surprise fans of Allen include the soulful, piano-driven song “Lost,” one of the first written at Peacock’s house. While Allen says the song — written as an answer to people who are always “telling you you are not where you should be or not where you thought you’d be” — has a little bit of “snark” to it, but isn’t intended to be rude. “It is the only song like it on the record,” he says.

“In Time,” he admits, is his most personal tracks, detailing his struggles after his accident. “It was a message to myself, but it is a really universal message that sometimes when things go bad, you have to take that time to let it get better,” he says. “It’s not going to immediately get there, and it was something that I needed to hear as far as things that I went through in the past year-and-a-half.”

Perhaps “In Time” can help others heal as well. On Aug. 2, the Idol community was rocked by news of the death of season seven finalist, Michael Johns -- Allen, among them. “One of my best experiences was hanging out with [Michael] at a Bruce Springsteen concert," he recalls. "He and his wife were always so warm to me and my family. He was a super fun dude to hang out with. I can’t imagine what his family is going through. It’s really sad to see something like that happen because you don’t see it coming and you can’t prepare for it. My prayers go out to his family. If something like that happened to someone on my season that I had spent the whole year with, there are so many people from that season, like David Cook and Brooke White, and those people knew him really, really well. When something like that happens with someone you spent the craziest time in your life with, it’s so sad.”

Speaking of his fellow season eight alums, Allen says Allison Iraheta is “killing it” as a backup singer for Rickey Minor’s band, as well as fronting her own group, Halo Circus. Says Allen: "I felt like she was the best singer ... on the show. Now she is so much better, which is scary. I’m proud of her.”

As for runner-up Adam Lambert’s triumphant turn touring with Queen this summer, Allen admits he hasn't caught the show, but adds, "I want to see it really bad. I’m a big Queen fan and I’m also an Adam fan and I’m sure he’s just perfect for the job.”

As for his own touring plans, Allen says he will stay on the road into the fall and beyond the announced dates, but can’t say exactly where yet. And for fans who loved the covers he did on his Out Alive tour, Allen teases that there are more to come. Just don’t expect him to do any John Mayer or Jason Mraz songs. “Those are really obvious," he says. "I try to stick to all the girl covers, because nobody ever thinks that a guy is going to do, like, a Katy Perry song."

Can we expect an Ariana Grande number in the set? Says Allen: "It could happen.”

Kris Allen will host a release party for Horizons with a 9 p.m. EDT show Aug. 12.

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Rosanne Cash to Receive Performing Arts Award From Smithsonian Magazine

By Joe Lynch | August 08, 2014 5:19 PM EDT

Rosanne cash

Clay Patrick McBride

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Michael Cera Released An Album, And It's Worth Hearing [LISTEN]

Michael Cera - 'true that' (2014)(Photo : Bandcamp)

Last night, actor Michael Cera released a surprise album through his Bandcamp page titled true that (you can see the album cover above). The 18-track album can be streamed for free right now, or purchased for seven dollars. Digital purchases of the album come with three bonus tracks.

Anyone going into true that expecting something jokey or tossed off (as I did) might find themselves surprised by the album's melancholic atmosphere. Much of the album is instrumental and has a folky, lo-fi, and even somewhat experimental aesthetic similar to the Microphones, the Music Tapes, or Elliott Smith. It's actually very good, though it probably wouldn't garner much attention if Cera weren't already a famous actor, unfortunately.

This solo album isn't the first time that the Arrested Development actor has ventured into the world of music. Back in 2010, he appeared on Weezer's song "Hang On," performing mandolin and backing vocals. In 2011, he joined the Pacific Northwest indie rock supergroup Mister Heavenly as a touring bassist, playing alongside members of Modest Mouse, The Unicorns, and Man Man. Cera also performed bass in the film Scott Pilgrim vs. The World, in which his character Scott Pilgrim is the bassist of a band called Sex Bob-omb.

[Edited 8/13/14 16:39pm]

Columbia Pictures

Like Zoolander 2 and Ghostbusters 3, a third Bad Boys movie has been one of the hot rumored sequels in recent years, because people apparently want to know what’s up with Miami’s most unrealistic police partners, Mike Lowrey and Marcus Burnett. But when it comes to Bad Boys 3, it always seems like it’s more of a push by Martin Lawrence to make it happen, and something that could eventually come together if Will Smith can find a few days in his incredibly busy schedule of encouraging his teenage son to pretend he’s the world’s youngest and wisest adult.

Lawrence was a guest on last night’s Conan to promote his new FX series Partners, and Conan O’Brien naturally asked the big question on everyone’s mind: “I heard a rumor that there’s going to be a Bad Boys 3, is that possible?” Lawrence admitted that he “just talked to Jerry Bruckheimer,” who told him that “it’s real, they’re working on the script, it’s getting close and it all looks good.” I guess the thing that’s taking them so long is the development of a new luxury automobile that two Miami police officers can drive around. It might be stupid, but you have to be consistent.

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Here’s the first trailer for Mortdecai, starring Johnny Depp, which is sadly not about Richie Tenenbaum’s falcon. It stars human reaction shot generator Depp as the titular character and literally every single joke is Johnny Depp making a funny face.

Mortdecai is directed by David Koepp (Premium Rush, Stir of Echoes) and written by Eric Aronson (?), based on the ‘Charlie Mortdecai’ series by Kyril Bonfiglioli (???) who died in 1985. According to Wiki:

Charlie Mortdecai is the fictional art dealer anti-hero of the series. His character resembles, among other things, an amoral Bertie Wooster with occasional psychopathic tendencies.

Bonfiglioli’s style and novel structure have often been favourably compared to that of P. G. Wodehouse. Mortdecai and his manservant Jock Strapp bear a fun-house mirror relation to Wodehouse’s Wooster and Jeeves. The author makes a nod to this comparison by having Mortdecai reference Wodehouse in the novels.

The movie supposedly deals with “a stolen painting that’s reportedly linked to a lost bank account filled with Nazi gold,” but I say supposedly because the trailer mostly consists of Johnny Depp making silly faces while horns play (oh, and Gwyneth Paltrow!). It actually reminds me a lot of Colin Firth in Gambit, and I told you how that went.

I’ll be honest, I don’t get it. I double don’t get it. I can barely watch Farrelly Brothers movies that I loved in the 90s because a lot of the jokes don’t work anymore. Are they really expecting to take books from the 1970s (that borrow heavily from books written in the 1920s) and just stick the main character into 2014 with no explanation? It’s harder to laugh when you’re busy wondering why the main character always seems like he’s at a costume party. At least in The Brady Bunch or 21 Jump Street the part where they were unstuck in time was overtly part of the joke. Here I’m not sure what the joke is. You know, other than “mustaches!” Haha, get it? Mustaches are hilarious.

Trailers that focus heavily on the mustache angle are fast becoming the new nutshot in the trailer.

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Lifetime announced yesterday that they’re going to be airing a television movie based on the tragic life and death of actress Brittany Murphy, because of course they are, who passed away in 2009 from unknown causes. The film is to star Amanda Fuller — who has previously appeared in Last Man Standing, Grey’s Anatomy, and a bunch of other stuff I’ve never watched — as Brittany, and Sherilyn Fenn (a.k.a. Audrey Horne from Twin Peaks) as her mother Sharon.

The two-hour film will premiere on September 6th on Lifetime, and the Hollywood Reporter has some details:

The movie will recount the story of Brittany Murphy’s younger years, including her mother’s efforts to turn her talented daughter into a star in the 1980s and ’90s, and then leads up to her death. It will also touch on the aftermath, when her mother dealt with claims that her daughter’s death was not accidental.

While Lifetime has not revealed the source of the script material, a spokesperson for Sharon Murphy has said she was not consulted for the movie and has not cooperated with the production in any way.

I guess it was only a matter of time before Lifetime mined Brittany Murphy for a biopic, the biggest surprise here is that they waited almost five years. Sadly, although Murphy was (in my opinion) both a brilliant comedic and dramatic actress, the end of her life actually did more closely resemble something akin to a Lifetime movie, with her shocking and shady death. I still fully believe that she was murdered by her creepy creep (now also deceased) husband Simon Monjack and/or her creepy creepy mother — while others think the government had something to do with it. Either way, no one knows what happened for sure, so any kind of insight into her passing is going to have to be rampant speculation at best, or total bullsh*t at worst on Lifetime’s part.

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Exclusive Song Premiere: Lauren Jenkins Gives Motley Crue's 'Looks That Kill' a Country Twist

By Chuck Dauphin, Nashville | August 13, 2014 1:41 PM EDT

Lauren Jenkins photographed in 2014 by Allie Stoller.

Allie Stoller

Wednesday is a big day for country newcomer Lauren Jenkins, who's being signed to Big Machine Label Group, Billboard is revealing exclusively in addition to premiering her countrified twist on Motley Crue's "Looks That Kill" from the cover album Nashville Outlaws: A Tribute To Motley Crue (due out Aug. 19).

Listen to the exclusive track below:

“It’s weird to see my name on iTunes -- weird, but amazing,” Jenkins tells Billboard. “Seeing my name with all the other artists doesn’t seem real,” she says of the album’s track list, which includes Florida Georgia Line, Rascal Flatts, Gretchen Wilson and other country stars.

“When [Big Machine CEO] Scott Borchetta has an idea, it’s probably in your best interest to hear him and out and follow it. But when he asked me to be a part of the Motley Crue record, I thought he was out of his mind. Taking on something like that, you are obviously taking a risk. People will either love it or they will hate it. I really like the track we came up with, and the arrangement. We tried to keep some of the original feel and structure, but we definitely did it totally different.”

Music has been a part of the Texas native's life since she can remember. “The first concert my dad ever took me to, I was six years old,” she recalls. “I grew up going to every show that he would take me to. A lot of my musical influences came from him -- acts like Tom Petty and the Allman Brothers. Then I started listening to rap music, hip-hop and jazz, a little bit of everything. I think that shaped the different sound I’ve got going on.”

As she entered into her teenage years, she knew singing was in her future. “When I was fifteen, I started homeschooling, so I could travel and pursue music. I got accepted into The William Esper Studio [for acting] a couple of years ago, and decided to just go for it. It was a lot of work, but it turned out well," she says. "I’m glad I found Big Machine Label Group and got out of New York before I went completely broke.”

In 2013, her team decided it was time to make the push for a label. “My producer Trey Bruce had emailed me, and said he was thinking about getting out some of our demos to the labels around town. I told him to go for it,” she says. “I think Scott Borchetta called him back within a few hours, and the next day I was booking a flight to Nashville.”

Signing on the dotted line with Big Machine Label Group was a dream come true and a definite game-changer. “It was so overwhelming. I am so blessed. It changes things once you are signed because before that, I was just doing what I wanted to do, and didn’t really have anyone to answer to, but I was really doing it all on my own. So, to have their support is great," she says. "The whole label is a family, and they really support you. I haven’t really told many of my friends yet. It was a secret -- until now, I guess.”

Jenkins is already at work on her debut album for the label, with half of the album already cut. While that disc isn’t expected until next year, Jenkins is excited about what the future holds. “It’s crazy, and has been so fun. It’s a lot of hard work, but I’ve been doing this since I was fifteen, so that’s nothing new to me," says Jenkins. "This is what I’ve dreamed of all my life.”

Listen here: http://www.billboard.com/...-that-kill

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Late last year, Netflix and Marvel dropped a bomb on the pop...announcing that the streaming service will begin airing four television series built around separate Marvel superheroes, followed by another mini-series that combined them all into The Defenders. Daredevil will be the first of those four series, and since that announcement, the series has begun filming and while we still don’t know any of the plot details (expect an origin story), we do have a lot more information now than we did back in November.

Here’s what we know, so far:

– We learned at this year’s Comic Con that Daredevil will premiere on Netflix in May 2015.

– We do not yet know whether Daredevil will meet the other street-level superheroes (Luke Cage, iron Fist, Jessica Cage) during the Daredevil series, but they will all meet up in the Defenders mini-series, which will air after the four individual series.

– Charlie Cox will play Matt Murdock, a blind lawyer who fights for justice in the courtroom and out of the courtroom as the masked vigilante Daredevil.

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– Vincent D’Onofrio is the villain, the Kingpin, a feared crime lord in the Marvel universe.

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– Deborah Ann Woll is Karen Page, the love interest of Daredevil.

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– Elden Henson (below, on the left) will play Foggy Nelson, Matt Murdock’s best friend and law partner.

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– Rosario Dawson has been cast in an unnamed role, described by Marvel as “a dedicated young woman whose quest to heal the wounds of Hell’s Kitchen brings Matt Murdock unexpectedly crashing into her life, while her own journey forever alters the course of his battle against the injustices of this broken city.” Many believe that Dawson will play Elektra.

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– Steven DeKnight — a former Buffy the Vampire Slayer writer, and the showrunner on Spartacus — will run Daredevil. Drew Goddard (Cabin in the Woods) was originally supposed to run the show, as well as write and direct the pilot, but he has since left the project to focus on the Spider-Man spin-off, Sinister Six. Goddard has remained on, however, as a consultant.

– There will be 13 hour-long episodes of the series.

– It’s being filmed in Hell’s Kitchen this summer, and as Steven DeKnight notes, “We’re going for a gritty, 1970s’ New York feel for the show. We love the idea of beauty and the decay of the city, and Hell’s Kitchen being a place that’s both beautiful and gritty at the same time. And that’s why Matt Murdock loves it and wants to protect it.”

– Farren Blackburn (The Fades, Doctor Who) is expected to direct an episode.

– If the series are popular on Netflix, they could earn their own feature films, according to Disney CEO Bob Iger.

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Exclusive: Erica Nicole Gets Candid About Her Longtime Struggle With Hearing Loss

By Chuck Dauphin | August 13, 2014 4:27 PM EDT

Country singer Erica Nicole photographed in 2014.

David Abbott

'Paper Planes': Melbourne Review

Courtesy of Melbourne Film Festival

Ed Oxenbould in "Paper Planes"

The Bottom Line

A winsome feelgood tale that pushes all the right buttons, though seldom gently.

Venue

Melbourne International Film Festival (Next Gen)

Cast

Sam Worthington, Ed Oxenbould, Deborah Mailman, Nicholas Bakopoulos-Cooke, Ena Imai, Terry Norris, Peter Rowsthorn, Julian Dennison, David Wenham

Director

Robert Connolly

Ed Oxenbould plays a junior underdog from the West Australian sticks competing in the big leagues in Robert Connolly's exuberant family film, which also stars Sam Worthington

Australian writer-director-producer Robert Connolly’s recent projects have ranged from political (Balibo) to topical (Underground: The Julian Assange Story) to literary (The Turning). He ventures off on a new track with Paper Planes, an uplifting family film that taps into a national screen tradition spanning from 1976’s Storm Boy through 2011’s Red Dog, particularly recalling the broad storytelling strokes and disarming corn of the latter. While grownups in search of subtlety and nuance need not apply, the loud cheers of the young audience at the Melbourne International Film Festival’s inaugural Kids Gala suggest that the material connects with its target demographic.

Connolly has drawn some heavy-hitters to this project, from Hollywood traveler Sam Worthington in an uncharacteristically recessive lead role to local favorites Deborah Mailman and David Wenham in the supporting ranks and Eric Bana among the executive producers. But it’s the child actors, led by Ed Oxenbould as 12-year-old Dylan, who carry most of the weight. And while their handling of the over-written dialogue in Connolly and Steve Worland’s screenplay is short on naturalistic restraint, their tween peers in the audience will be unlikely to mind.

In addition to the rugged beauty of the rural Western Australian landscapes, handsomely captured in glossy widescreen images by cinematographer Tristan Milani, one of the early stars of the action is the house where Dylan lives with his depressed dad Jack (Worthington). Production designer Clayton Jauncey has either built or found a run-down, tin-roof dwelling in lonely bush country that is a gorgeous chunk of rustic Australiana, accompanied the first time we see it by the gentle song of magpies.

In what appears to be a daily ritual, Dylan gets himself off to school with no help from couch-bound Dad, swiping a bacon rasher from the fridge to feed a friendly whistling kite hawk he calls Clive. Brief memory flashes indicate that Dylan’s mother is no longer around. The circumstances of her loss are revealed later as Jack’s consuming sorrow puts a continued strain on his relationship with his son.

In the first school scene, Connolly and Worland amusingly acknowledge the incongruousness of their low-tech, hand-made plot driver in a plugged-in world of gadgetry by having chipper teacher Mr. Hickenlooper (Peter Rowsthorn) collect all the kids’ smart phones, tablets and videogame devices before class. A guest speaker gives the students a demonstration of how to make an aerodynamic paper plane, and informs them of the upcoming regional finals. Dylan proves a natural, whetting his appetite to compete.

That first paper plane flight, bobbing and weaving through school corridors and all over the grounds, adds an unapologetic flourish of CGI fantasy to a fundamentally old-fashioned story. The flying sequences of both the planes and Clive make the film a prime candidate for 3D conversion.

Variations on the moral lesson that winning or losing are less important than how you play the game come thick and fast as Dylan makes his way through state and national contests to the international junior championship in Tokyo. Positive and negative examples are embodied, respectively, by sweet-natured Japanese competitor Kimi (Ena Imai) and cocky Australian rival Jason (Nicholas Bakopoulos-Cooke), whose hubris is a worry to his dad (Wenham), a renowned professional golfer.

The formulaic script’s aversion to subtext means pretty much every message is hammered and every development telegraphed. But there are genuinely moving moments between Oxenbould’s resilient Dylan and Worthington’s emotionally broken Jack.

Connolly indulges in some shameless audience pandering, notably via the stock character of Dylan’s Grandpa (Terry Norris), a rascally oldster dispensing unorthodox mentorship; Kevin (Julian Dennison), a young bully-turned-ally; and Maureen (Mailman), a chronically perky former paper-plane champ.

Chris Noonan, the wizard behind the sui generis standout Australian family film Babe, is credited as consulting director. We’re a long way from the sheer enchantment of that modern classic here, and the kind of crossover appeal in the adult market that even Red Dog enjoyed seems unlikely. But the humor, charm, tender family scenes and joyous life lessons en route to the inevitable climactic notes of triumph and reconciliation keep Paper Planes aloft.

Cast: Sam Worthington, Ed Oxenbould, Deborah Mailman, Nicholas Bakopoulos-Cooke, Ena Imai, Terry Norris, Peter Rowsthorn, Julian Dennison, David Wenham

Production company: Arenamedia

Director: Robert Connolly

Screenwriters: Robert Connolly, Steve Worland

Producers: Robert Connolly, Maggie Miles, Liz Kearney

Executive producers: Andrew Myer, Jonathan Chissick, Gary Hamilton, Ying Ye, Bernadette O’Mahony, Eric Bana

Director of photography: Tristan Milani

Production designer: Clayton Jauncey

Costume designer: Lien See Leong

Music: Nigel Westlake

Editor: Nick Meyers

Visual effects & animation: John Francis, Surreal World

Sales: Arclight Films

No rating; 96 minutes.

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Danielia Cotton ft. Rachael Yamagata's 'Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)': Exclusive Song Premiere

By Harley Brown | August 13, 2014 12:00 PM EDT

Danielia Cotton (Photo credit: Chia Messina)

Sweet dreams are made of Eurythmics covers, from Marilyn Manson's grungy, simmering boil to Korean girl group Girls' Generation's medley of, ah, "Sweet Dreams" and "Get the Party Started" medley. Now, New Jersey jazz singer and guitarist Danielia Cotton has added her own version to the canon with pianist and violinist Rachael Yamagata.

Taken from her upcoming covers album, The Real Book (out Oct. 21 via Cottontown) -- featuring versions of songs by Bruno Mars, Stevie Wonder, and the Rolling Stones, to name a few -- Cotton's "Sweet Dreams" is a blues-infused romp through a sawdust-covered saloon or a smoky speakeasy, orchestrated with tinkling pianos, surging strings and Cotton's soulful backing vocals.

Of the song, Cotton tells Billboard, “The way that I approached the song is that it is about being used by someone. I took it to represent the importance of trucking through a situation even when you realize someone is taking advantage of you. You have to ‘hold your head up.’ The upside of situations like that is that you learn to be aware of people trying to use you and truck through it.”

Sweet Dreams: http://www.billboard.com/...-exclusive

Bruno Mars Cover: https://soundcloud.com/sh...mars-cover

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Jackie Gleason

With Steve Mcqueen

With Lucille Ball

Amber Heard: Seen and Heard

An engagement ring from Johnny Depp is getting the model-actress all kinds of attention.

• May 27, 2014 10:22 AM | by Lynn Hirschberg
• Photography by Steven Klein
  Styled by Edward Enninful

“Don’t you think she looks like me?” Amber Heard asks as she pets her horse, Arrow. Heard, 28, is wearing mud-caked riding boots, tight blue jeans, a white undershirt, and thin mesh gloves that partially cover her red-lacquered nails; she puts her face next to the horse’s long tan-colored muzzle and coyly flips her ponytail. In fact, they do look alike: both lanky, pale, and blonde. Arrow nuzzles Heard, hoping for something to eat. “So like me,” Heard continues, reaching down into a pail filled with horse snacks. She feeds Arrow an apple. “She’ll love you forever if you give her a treat.” Heard watches the horse as she demolishes the apple. “Just standing here makes my blood pressure go down,” she says. “When I’m in L.A., I come ride her five times a week. No matter how crazy things get, Arrow will immediately get me back to normal.”

Although she is careful not to spell it out, Heard is probably alluding to the hoopla surrounding her recent engagement to Johnny Depp, her costar in 2011’s The Rum Diary, which was based on an early novel by Hunter S. Thompson. Before making that film, Heard had worked steadily, appearing in films like 2008’s Pineapple Express (as Seth Rogen’s high school girlfriend), 2004’s Friday Night Lights (as Garrett Hedlund’s high school girlfriend), and 2009’s The Joneses (as a high school girl who falls in love with an older man, David Duchovny). In The Rum Diary, she was no longer high school material—she was the complex, mysterious woman who haunts Thompson in Puerto Rico. “It’s very hard to find opportunities like that as a young romantic lead,” Heard says, leading Arrow out of her paddock to be groomed. “As a woman, I usually have two options: Sex Object or the Best Friend Who Isn’t Sexy. It’s not creatively fulfilling to just be sexy. I did nothing to look the way I look. The genetic cards that anyone is dealt are not in their control, so to take pride in my looks would be a mistake. And besides,” she continues, pointing to the horse, “in L.A. there’s always someone more beautiful!”

As a former Guess Jeans model, Heard had practically come to expect being typecast. “I remember getting a small part in the movie Zombieland,” she continues. “I said to the director, ‘Do I get to play a true zombie or am I a cleavage zombie?’ I had this fear that he was going to want me to be a zombie in my underwear! He said, ‘No—take it as far as you want.’ I said, ‘Get the vomit packs ready! I’m going to be ugly and gross!’%u200A”

According to friends, it was Heard’s intensity and independent attitude that attracted Depp most. “I have always wanted to go,” Heard explains. Growing up in Austin, Texas, she was restless and ambitious. “I didn’t want to be stuck there. And modeling was a way to see a much bigger world.” Heard is very close to her father, a contractor who also breaks horses—including Arrow. “He taught me a lot about animals, about cars, and about resilience. That’s what happens when your father doesn’t have a son. I drew the line at learning about football. I had to rebel somehow.”

The mix of raised-like-a-boy and prettiest-girl-in-town is what makes Heard intriguing—she’s feminine but tough. “Whenever my old friends meet someone I’m involved with romantically, they immediately warn them: ‘She may look refined, but when she’s angry, she can go trailer park really fast,’%u200A” Heard quips. “But I’d always rather be passionate than bland. I can’t imagine living a quiet life.”

I ask Heard if her life has changed since the engagement to Depp. At a press conference recently, Depp showed off the ring that he had bought for her—it was too big for her finger, so he was wearing the diamond sparkler. And two nights prior to our meeting, there had been a star-studded engagement party (Marilyn Manson! Steven Tyler!) at the 1920s Carondelet House in downtown Los Angeles. But Heard is more discreet than Depp. “I haven’t noticed any change in my career,” she says guardedly. “And, for better or worse, I’ve always had a love life that seemed particularly salacious to some people. Before, it was also seen as unconventional,” she adds, alluding to the fact that she had been romantically involved with women.

Her history with the press has taught Heard to be cautious and self-protective. She switches rental cars every week so that the paparazzi can’t easily spot her. To suss out press leaks, she regularly slips different bits of false information to her friends. When one of her fake items appears in the tabloids, Heard knows whom she can’t trust. “I do miss driving my Mustang,” she says. “I built it from scratch, and I love that car. But the photographers all know the Mustang, and I hate being hassled. So it’s stuck in the garage.”

The next day, Heard is flying to New York, where she will be filming the father-daughter drama When I Live My Life Over Again with Christopher Walken. Her character sings, and Heard has been taking hours of vocal training every day to prepare. “I thought I was tone-deaf,” Heard says, giving Arrow one last apple. “And in truth, I have no natural gift or knack for singing. Generally, when a person has no talent for something, they don’t pursue it. So I’m either brave or stupid.” She pats Arrow’s nose goodbye. “The girl I’m playing is in a punk band, and she’s a little weird. Not sexy-weird but plain weird-weird. Which is thrilling to me. I like weird. I might be blonde and wear lipstick, but I’m so happy to be strange.”

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[Edited 8/14/14 12:12pm]

Halle Berry

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Elvis's granddaughter Riley Keough gets engaged to her stuntman beau Ben Smith-Petersen

By George Stark for MailOnline

Published: Updated: 16:25 EST, 14 August 2014

Elvis Presley's granddaughter Riley Keough is engaged, her boyfriend claims.

Riley's boyfriend Ben Smith-Petersen posted the news on his Facebook page on Wednesday.

The stuntman wrote: 'So that happened' against a picture of himself with 25-year-old Riley posing with a ring on her engagement finger.

+3

'So that happened': Elvis Presley's granddaughter Riley Keough 'gets engaged to her stuntman beau Ben Smith-Petersen' who posted this picture on his Facebook

A series of congratulations from friends followed on the post.

The pair went public with their romance in January this year when they were seen putting on a PDA in Los Angeles.

Ben's credits as a stuntman include the upcoming Mad Max: Fury Road and The Hunger Games: Catching Fire.

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Love Me Tender: Riley and Ben attend amfAR's 21st Cinema Against AIDS Gala presented by WORLDVIEW, BOLD FILMS, and BVLGARI at Hotel du Cap-Eden-Roc in May this year

Archive: Riley Keough on the 2014 AmfAR Gala red carpet

Zoe Kravitz

Previously, Riley was engaged to actor Alex Pettyfer and was previously linked to Robert Pattinson.

Riley is the daughter of Lisa Marie Presley and Danny Keough.

A source previously told JustJared that the pair met on set of Mad Max: Fury Road'.

They told the site: 'Ben worked as a stuntman alongside Riley on the set of Mad Max: Fury Road. They’ve become inseparable.'

+3

Happy couple: The pair went public in January this year after Riley split with actor Alex Pettyfer

Movie set ... Rosie Huntington-Whiteley, left, posted this picture of her with her Mad Max: Fury Road co-stars Riley Keough (right) and Zoe Kravitz (centre) in Namibia, Africa. Source: Supplied

Nicole Richie, Cara Delevingne, Zooey Deschanel, Riley Keough, Zoë Kravitz, and Hayden Panettiere

Billboard Cover: Ariana Grande on Fame, Freddy Krueger and Her Freaky Past

By Lizzy Goodman | August 15, 2014 9:00 AM EDT

Ariana Grande photographed by Austin Hargrave at Quixote in Los Angeles on July 29, 2014.

Austin Hargrave

Skateboarding pioneer Jay Adams dies in Mexico

By Colin Bane

Published Friday August 15, 2014

Jay Adams, a skateboarding pioneer and one of the original members of the Zephyr skate team, died in Puerto Escondido, Mexico, early Friday morning. He was 53.

Adams' manager, Susan Ferris, says the Skateboarding Hall of Famer died of a heart attack. A full report from the Puerto Escondido medical examiner's office is pending.

Adams had been on an extended surf vacation in Mexico with his wife and friends, including Solo Scott and Allen Sarlo. He had been surfing across the point earlier Thursday and came in feeling sick, then began having chest pains around midnight, according to Scott.

"His wife called us over in the middle of the night and we administered CPR until we could get an ambulance, and they kept working on him the whole way but he never revived," Scott told XGames.com.

"The important thing is he went out peacefully in his sleep, during the best surf trip of his life. He'd been down here for three months surfing every day, and he was in great shape and really good spirits. I've never seen him so happy and content and at peace."

Adams was known for bringing his aggressive surf style to skateboarding, first on the sidewalks of Venice, California, and eventually into the area's empty backyard pools. He was the first to air above the lip in a pool on a skateboard and the first to try handplants and other tricks that since have become staples.

Jay Adams, left, with actor Emile Hirsch at the 2005 premiere of "Lords of Dogtown" in Hollywood, Calif. (Stephen Sugerman, Getty)

"I've had the good fortune of spending decades in this sport, and he was the purest form of skateboarder that I've ever seen," Stacy Peralta, another original member of the Z-Boys team and director of the documentary film "Dogtown and Z-Boys," told XGames.com. "He was literally skateboarding incarnate, and the genius of it was he wasn't the best at anything, he just was it. I've said before that he was the original virus that got so many people hooked on skateboarding. Now the original spore is gone, but that virus lives on in so many others. Jay's passing reminds all of us and reaffirms that we're connected. We're all rolling down the sidewalk together."

Adams was the youngest member of the original Z-Boys skate team when it first formed in 1975, according to Zephyr Surf Shop owner and Z-Boys co-founder Jeff Ho.

"I first met Jay in the water when he was a little kid on a borrowed surfboard, even before he was the little kid on a skateboard everybody's seen pictures of," Ho told XGames.com. "You could tell even then that he was something special. Once the first photos of what he was doing on a skateboard came out, he was an instant icon. He was so creative in his skating that he was just so, so far beyond his time. He lived his life the way he wanted to live it, and, you know, he was surfing some mean sick barrels at Puerto and getting great shots with the boys right up until just before he passed away, still doing what he wanted to do."

Jim Muir, another member of the original Dogtown Z-Boys skate team, added: "Everyone involved in skateboarding needs to thank Jay for who he was and what he made our sport. He was one of a kind, and there will never be anyone else like him."

Adams will be remembered as much for his sneer and for flipping off the camera as for his brazen skateboarding prowess. When skateboarding got competitive and corporate and some of his peers became celebrities, he mostly opted out.

"Wearing uniforms? That wasn't me," he wrote in an essay for "My Rules," a forthcoming book by photographer Glen E. Friedman.

Friedman's first published image for Skateboarder Magazine was a shot of Adams airing above the lip in a pool for the first time. Adams was just 15 at the time; Friedman was 14. The image rocked the skateboarding world with new possibilities, even though Friedman admits Adams "was clearly not [landing the trick]."

Even Adams' accidents could be inspirational.

"When you look at Jay, you have to think of the personification of all the Dogtown stories that Craig Stecyk wrote and all the Dogtown photos that I took: All we were trying to do was capture Jay Adams' essence," Friedman told XGames.com. "He was really f---ed up, and he was really incredibly great, all at the same time. For so many, he was the inspiration, he was the seed. He was one of the originators, and he didn't do any of it on purpose. He was as spontaneous as they come, and because of that he was one of the sport's great revolutionaries."

Skateboarding legend Jay Adams with wife Tracy at the Venice Skate Park. Photo by Westside People

Friedman shared an excerpt of Adams' "My Rules" essay with XGames.com:

"I always skate for the love of it, the feeling that is like nothing else. Doing the thing I did, that some people after the fact look back and say it was so progressive and pushed the limits, that's cool but I wasn't thinking doing that. I just acted spontaneously and did stuff, see what happens and hope not to get hurt. I wouldn't think about it until afterwards, if at all. Style was a motivator at times, but honestly it just came naturally to me, and although it meant everything at times, who's to say the kook with horrible style isn't having more fun than you? Having fun is what really matters in the end, unless you're just out to impress others."

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Craig Ferguson Nears Deal for New Talk Show

CBS' exiting personality books a non-late-night gig with a new syndicated series for Tribune stations

CBS

Craig Ferguson

Craig Ferguson did not wait long to line up his next gig. The latest of many swift late-night transitions for 2014 finds the exiting The Late Late Show host nearing a pact for a new syndicated series.

Sources tell The Hollywood Reporter that Ferguson is finalizing a deal to host a new talker for Tribune-owned stations. Somewhat surprisingly, the new show will not be part of late night, likely airing at 7:30 p.m. That will alleviate a lot of similar competition for Ferguson, though the earlier start time is relatively untested waters for the format.

It will also tape in Ferguson's current studio at CBS' Television City lot and be quite similar to his current series, with occasional guest interviews. Tribune Broadcasting did not immediately respond to THR's request for comment.

It is not the only thing on Ferguson's plate. Before he signs off of his post-David Letterman hour in December, he'll have already premiered FremantleMedia North America and Debmar-Mercury's syndicated game show Celebrity Name Game.

News recently broke of Ferguson's likely CBS replacement. The network is circling British actor-comedian James Corden to take over The Late Late Show, though it has yet to make any formal announcement. CBS and Ferguson announced his exit shortly after the news that Stephen Colbert would move into Letterman's Late Show slot in 2015.

It's not immediately clear if Geoff Peterson, Ferguson's animatronic skeleton sidekick, is part of the deal.

Ferguson is repped by WME.

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Q&A: Jason Alexander on Directing His Career-Making Play, 'Seinfeld' Cast Friendships

Courtesy of Odyssey Theatre Ensemble

Jason Alexander

The actor revisits Neil Simon's Broadway Bound and talks Jerry, Elaine and Kramer: "We never became social friends."

Before he became known to millions as Jerry Seinfeld’s hilariously insecure best friend, George Costanza, Jason Alexander was a Broadway baby, playing Joe in the Kaufman-Hart classic, Merrily We Roll Along in 1981, and performing opposite Chita Rivera and Liza Minnelli in the 1984 musical, The Rink. His big break came in 1986 playing showbiz hopeful Stanley in the Pulitzer Prize finalist, Broadway Bound, Neil Simon’s semi-autobiographical classic about his fractured family life growing up in the Bronx.

Last year, when Alexander went down to La Mirada Theatre for the Performing Arts in southeast Los Angeles County to see a production of the play starring his close friend, Gina Hecht, the two got into a discussion after the show. “The next thing I know I got a call from them going, Hey, we got the opportunity at The Odyssey,” Alexander tells The Hollywood Reporter. “How would you feel about doing it?” Evidently he felt just fine about it, cause he’s directing the current production of Broadway Bound starring La Mirada holdovers Hecht, Allan Miller and Ian Alda (Alan’s nephew), at the Odyssey Theatre Ensemble in West Los Angeles through September 21^st.

The Hollywood Reporter: How different is this production compared to the Broadway version you were in back in 1986?

Jason Alexander:If you were looking just purely at the physical production of the play that I did and the play that I’m doing now you would probably say there’s more similarities than not. By the same token, we are emphasizing different things, different performances, different characters. Instead of a big proscenium stage and theater, we’re in a very intimate 99-seat house.

Returning to the play, do you see differences in yourself as a performer and as a man?

The biggest difference is when I first did it I was 27, so the part of the play that I understood on an innate level was Stanley and Eugene, the kids, their desire to begin their career, begin their lives, make a name for themselves, get out of the house, break away and try and take care of the family. The travails of mom and dad and their breakup and the travails of grandpa and his nonexistent relationship with his wife, all of those things, I appreciated them, I didn’t have the tools to understand them. Now I come into that thing at 54 and go, Oh, now that all makes some sense that it didn’t make before.

Is this where you see your career going, more toward directing?

If I could really move my career much more into predominantly directing, I would jump at that. If you’re asking me would I ever start a company like Reprise again, I probably wouldn’t endeavor to do that in Los Angeles. And then there’s the standup show, which I’ve been developing probably over the last three to five years. Is it my end all be all to become a standup comic? No. Was Vegas a blast? Yes. Would I go back and do more? Yes.

You did the Superbowl episode with Jerry Seinfeld for Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee. You guys keep in touch much?

We were work place friends. We spent so much delicious time together as a foursome working and enjoying each other. But even during those nine years we never became social friends. So when the show ended we had no history of doing that and we all kind of went our separate ways. So we do stay in email contact. When we do see each other it’s like no time has passed. It immediately becomes those relationships again.

It was surprising that a show about nothing would catch on the way it did.

The show was not an obvious success or likely success in its early incarnation. Normally in that situation actors tend to get very selfish and just try to get a good piece of tape that they can use to get their next job. But somehow our group, despite all the upheaval, became very supportive of each other. And that sort of generosity quickly made us into an ensemble and we took care of each other very quickly. I think the success of the show was in large part due to that.

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'Doctor Who' Premiere: New Star Peter Capaldi Hits NYC With Series Villain Cyberman

6:43 AM PST 08/15/2014 by Christy Smith-Sloman

Evan Agostini/Invision/AP

'Doctor Who's' Cyberman, Peter Capaldi and Jenna Coleman

Jenna Coleman and showrunner Steven Moffat arrived in a vintage taxi alongside series villain Cyberman

It was no surprise on Thursday night when rabid fans — or "Whovians" — lined 54th Street, 10 deep, in front of Ziegfeld Theater in anticipation for the New York City premiere of BBC America's hit sci-fi series Doctor Who, considering the 900 tickets released to the general public sold out in less than one minute.

New Doctor Peter Capaldi, co-star Jenna Coleman and showrunner Steven Moffat arrived in a vintage checkered taxi to deafening applause before stepping onto the Tardis blue carpet. Series villain Cyberman also made an appearance.

Capaldi, sharply dressed in a blue suit, white shirt and black patent leather shoes posed for selfies with eager fans before discussing his role as the new, mysterious time-traveling doctor.

"Once I became the Doctor, I invited Matt [Smith, former Doctor] to lunch to discuss the role, and he arrived on crutches. I said, 'What happened to you?' And he said, 'The show, mate,' " joked Capaldi. "Matt Smith and David Tennant have both been very kind and helpful to me. I often talk to them and text them and ask for advice. It's a very small club. We talk about stuff that only doctors can talk about."

Of his new take on the classic character, he added, "My Doctor is a little more dapper, a little more alien, a little less user-friendly, but he's a very enthusiastic and passionate person about the universe."

Capaldi made an appearance on the BBC's highest-rated series in November for the show's 50th anniversary.

"Fans can look forward to a brand-new Doctor and a brand-new take on the old man of space and time, and some fantastic new monsters and some fantastic old monsters," said showrunner Moffat, also the brains behind BBC show Sherlock. "The best thing about the new Doctor is that you'll get to see that old show that you know so well being brand-new and absolutely different, which is rather exciting."

Coleman, who plays Clara Oswald, was impeccably dressed in a floral print Dior mini. She discussed her complicated relationship with the Doctor. "We have some hilarious arguments," she said. "We are like a bickery old married couple who adore the bones of each other yet also can't stand each other and really disagree at the same time."

After the 80-minute screening, comedian and Doctor Who superfan Chris Hardwick discussed the upcoming season and moderated a discussion with Capaldi, Coleman and Moffat.

The first-ever Doctor Who world tour kicked off in Wales before reaching New York on Aug. 14. Capaldi and Coleman will also make stops in London, Seoul, Sydney, Mexico City and Rio de Janeiro to promote the show.

Doctor Who will return to U.S. screens for season eight on Aug. 23 at 8 p.m EST on BBC America.

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Esperanza Spalding Signs With WME

11:05 AM PST 08/15/2014 by Rebecca Sun, Marc Schneider, Billboard

AP Images/Invision

The Grammy-winning jazz musician was featured on Janelle Monae's 'The Electric Lady' album last fall

Grammy-winning jazz artist Esperanza Spalding has signed with WME, The Hollywood Reporter has learned.

The bassist, singer and composer joins a jazzed-up roster at the agency that also includes Diana Krall, Natalie Cole, Chris Botti and Preservation Hall Jazz Band.

Spalding famously defeated Justin Bieber (and fellow nominees Drake, Florence and the Machine and Mumford & Sons) for the Best New Artist Grammy in 2011, instantly earning the ire of Beliebers online. The Oregon native has since collected three more Grammys, including Best Jazz Vocal Album for 2012's Radio Music Society, which became her first top-10 album on the Billboard 200.

Spalding was recently a guest artist on Janelle Monae's The Electric Lady and Bruno Mars' Unorthodox Jukebox albums. She is currently in Poland, where she is curating and hosting Esperanza+, a large-scale jazz concert during the Solidarity of Arts festival on Aug. 16

She records for Heads Up International and continues to be repped by attorneys Zamin Mirza and Stuart Silfen of Frankfurt Kurnit.

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News | Bob Mitchell, Elvis Presley, Scotty Moore

August 15, 2014 2:06 pm

Elvis died 37 years ago tomorrow, so we honor his history in Louisville today

by David Serchuk

Elvis Presley and band, Louisville, 1955. Photo courtesy University of Louisville.

Elvis Presley died on Aug. 16, 1977, at his home in Memphis, Tenn.

But Louisville was a touchstone to The King through his personal life, and career.

For starters his grandfather Jesse Presley lived here from the mid 1940s through his death in 1973. It’s hard to get a read on how close the two were, some say not very, but Elvis did at least buy the old man a Ford Fairlane in 1956, possibly the first vehicle he ever purchased for someone, though many followed. He also visited him here.

Also, Elvis played some key early shows in Louisville, with his first and most famous band. The first show took place Dec. 8, 1955, at the Rialto Theater, now gone, on Fourth Street. Elvis wasn’t the headliner, but rather was part of a lineup for the Hank Snow All-Star Jamboree, which included Snow, of course, and Benjamin Francis Ford, aka The Duke of Paducah. And you don’t get much more Kentucky than that.

The show was held for employees of Philip-Morris and received no local promotion. Elvis, of course, was not a household name yet, so his supporting role makes sense. According to the surprisingly informative website Scottymoore.net, which is maintained and written by James V. Roy (Moore being Elvis’s first, and likely best-known guitarist), the theater did promote the event on its marquee, even as it also promoted the movies “Tarantula!” and “Running Wild.”

The following year, 1956, proved a different story. By then Elvis had started to break out nationally and played two shows at the Jefferson County Armory, in Louisville, on Nov. 25, 1956. Elvis had just starred in his recently released first film, “Love Me Tender,” and had lots of fans ready to see him do his thing. But not only fans.

In a twist of rock ‘n roll coincidence, Bill Haley and His Comets also were booked to perform the same day at the Kentucky State Fairground, also in Louisville. The local police grew agitated, concerned these two early titans of rock would incite fans to riot, and contacted the FBI.

Declassified FBI files (yes the FBI actually made files about this) show what law enforcement was concerned about, and how they planned to respond. Louisville’s Chief of Police Chief Carl E. Heustis contacted the Bureau.

Here is what the FBI’s Nov. 9, 1956 ...n response: “Colonel Carl E. Heustis … this day advised that Elvis Presley and Bill Haley and His Comets, rivals for the attention of ‘rock and roll’ fans, are simultaneously booked for appearances … November 25 next. Colonel Heustis is advised he has received information that there have been riots at Jersey City, New Jersey, Asbury Park, New Jersey, Santa Cruz, Santa Jose, California, Hartford, Connecticute and Jacksonville, Florida as result of such simultaneous appearances.”

The FBI also said, in another note, from Nov. 7, 1956, that while riots were reported by newspapers, “the Bureau has no specific information about these disturbances.”

The compromise? A Nov. 15 article, dateli... announced “a no-wiggle restriction has been placed on Elvis Presley’s appearance here Nov. 25 … Police chief Carl Heustis said yesterday he won’t permit ‘any lewd, lascivious contortions that would excite a crowd’ when the long-sideburned, guitar-strumming singer comes to town.”

The article concluded: “‘As you can surmise,’” the Chief said, ‘I just don’t happen to be one of his admirers.’”

According to ScottyMoore.net, “Ultimately, portions of the matinee show at the Armory (were) filmed (reputedly by the police and most likely as evidence in case Elvis violated his restrictions), unfortunately for posterity, without sound.”

The shows sold well, with the 2 p.m. performance holding 8,311 and the 8 p.m. show holding 8,349.

Elvis and Co. stayed at the Seelbach Hotel.

Writing for the “Louisville Times” writer Eugene Lees reviewed the show. It’s not a glowing review. “Elvis Presley and about 15,000 dyed-in-the wool fans yesterday gave Louisville one of the most fascinating studies in mob psychology the city has ever had the questionable pleasure of witnessing.”

It gets better: “Elvis was preceded by a vaudeville-type show that included a magician, a balancing act and a male quartet—a very good quartet, if anyone bothered to notice, the Jordinaires.”

Finally Presley took the stage. More Eugene Lees: “Simultaneously a roar went up that seemed sure to blast the walls from the armory. And Elvis appeared in a Kelly-green, neon-bright jacket. The small combo of musicians to accommodate him wore dazzling red. He stepped to the microphone. The teen-agers–girls far out numbered the boys–screamed. Elvis turned his head. They screamed again. He blew across the microphone (checking apparently if it was turned on.) The crowd screamed.

“He sang. But one couldn’t hear a word of it, though his hit tunes such as ‘Don’t Be Cruel’ were vaguely recognizable by the dull chord changes behind Presley. Presley kept bumps and grinds to a minimum, in compliance with an order issued some days ago by Col. Carl Heustis, chief of police. But there were occasional hints of the pelvis manipulations that are credited, as much as anything, with making Elvis Presley a household word. And those really brought the house down.”

One Louisville citizen who saw the show was Bob Mitchell, who sometimes DJs on WFPK.

As a budding guitarist, Mitchell, then a teenager, was far more interested in seeing Scotty Moore than Elvis, and after the show simply walked backstage, camera in tow, and wandered around until he met the guitarist in his dressing room, snapping a picture for posterity (see above).

“I knew where the dressing rooms were, and I just walked back, nobody said a word,” he says.

He knocked on the band’s dressing room door, and was invited in, even though the band had no idea who this kid was. He stayed for 20-30 minutes simply chatting with Moore, bassist Bill Black, and drummer D.J. Fontana.

“Scotty showed me a couple of things on his guitar,” he says. “Probably some little run that he’d done on one of his songs.”

Things started to wind down, and the band asked Mitchell if he wanted to meet Elvis at the hotel, but he didn’t. He had school the next day and had to catch the bus home. Also, he didn’t really care if he met the singer. He’d met Moore and felt satisfied.

“Elvis was OK, but what really turned me on was that guitar playing, I just had never heard anything like it,” he says. “Elvis, believe it or not, was secondary.”

Elvis played Louisville on four other occasions before his death, including May 21, 1977. In a nice bit of symmetry this show also was panned by the local press. The writer was Billy Reed, writing for The Courier-Journal.

“His music and his personality, fusing the styles of white country and black rhythm and blues, permanently changed the face of American popular culture. His following was immense, and he was a symbol to people the world over of the vitality, rebelliousness, and good humor of his country.”

President Jimmy Carter
August 17, 1977

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Candlelight vigil marks Elvis’ death in Memphis

AP Photo/The Commercial Appeal, Mark Weber

Sharon Kestner, left, enjoys the sounds of Elvis, as Brian Bush rests his head on her shoulder outside the gates of Graceland during a candlelight vigil in remembrance of Elvis’ death 37 years-ago, Friday, Aug. 15, 2014, in Memphis, Tenn. Kestner and Bush are from Lexington, Ky.

By Adrian Sainz, Associated Press

Friday, Aug. 15, 2014 | 8:12 p.m.

MEMPHIS, Tenn. — Holding flickering candles, fans of Elvis Presley made a slow, nighttime walk past his gravesite at Graceland on Friday, marking the anniversary of his death 37 years ago.

Fans strolled quietly through the Mediation Garden at Graceland, Presley's longtime Memphis, Tenn., home. Presley's grave is in the garden, and his mother, father and grandmother are buried there.

The home is now a museum and a centerpiece of the Graceland tourist attraction that draws about 500,000 fans each year from around the world.

People began arriving early in the day to get a spot in line outside Graceland's gates. Tourists also watched Elvis tribute artists sing and dance, and visited gift shops and Elvis-related exhibits across the street from the home.

The scene is repeated each year on the anniversary of the death of the King of Rock 'n' Roll. Presley died at age 42 on Aug. 16, 1977, of a heart attack, shocking and saddening his fans worldwide.

Mark Summers, 31, said it was his first time attending the vigil. Summers, of Birmingham, England, is an Elvis tribute artist who performs theater shows across Europe.

Summers wore a black shirt, black pants and a hairstyle shaped like a pompadour, just like his idol. He said no other performer "could touch the charisma he had on stage."

Summers said he admired Presley not only for his music and his act, but also for his good qualities as a person. Presley was known for giving money to charities and cars to fans.

"So generous, caring, loving, spiritual, all those kinds of things," Summers said. "Tonight is going to be really emotional."

The vigil is a highlight of Elvis Week, an annual celebration of Presley's career and his life. This year, other Elvis Week events have included an auction of authenticated Presley artifacts — which included a 1977 Cadillac Seville used by Presley — and the groundbreaking of a planned 450-room hotel at the Graceland tourist attraction.

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Glenn Danzig Reports an Elvis Presley Covers EP Coming during 2015

Glenn Danzig(Photo : Getty Images)

We should have learned by now that stories about Glenn Danzig don't bring in the big hits, but we just can't stop from coming back. Everything about the guy, from lawsuits to proposed golden statues of him riding a dragon in Austin, is awesome. This week's tidbit: The former Misfits frontman will be releasing an extended play of Elvis Presley covers at some point during 2015.

"So strange how things happen," tweeted on of the least likely people to have a Twitter. "Working in studio all this week on 'Danzig sings Elvis' ep & tonight is anniversary of day Elvis died. RIP EAP GD 08/16/14."

Danzig has often been referred to as the "Evil Elvis" due to his undeniably similar vocal style (you've heard the song "Mother," if nothing else). Having seen the icon live in person, we can sadly acknowledge that having gained some weight over the years, the Samhain singer also resembles elder Elvis in the way he struts around stage.

We can't be sure but we're hoping that Danzig Sings Elvis isn't the actual title of the album whenever it comes out. Undead Memphis or something a little more macabre would be preferred. Either way, good to know that Danzig is working on anything. His last album, Deth Red Sabaoth, was released during 2010.

Actress Norma McCarty, Ed Wood’s Wife, Dies at 93

Courtesy Wade Williams

McCarty in 'Plan 9 From Outer Space'

She appeared as a stewardess in his legendary 1959 film 'Plan 9 From Outer Space'

Writer-director Ed Wood's wife Norma McCarty, an actress who appeared in his infamously awful 1959 film Plan 9 From Outer Space, has died. She was 93.

McCarty died peacefully on June 27 at Santa Clarita Convalescent Hospital in Newhall, Calif., her son by a previous marriage, Michael McCarty, told The Hollywood Reporter.

Norma McCarty played the stewardess Edith in Plan 9 From Outer Space, Wood’s ultra low-budget film about aliens who resurrect Earth’s dead in an attempt to thwart the creation of a weapon that could destroy the universe. Bela Lugosi is famously seen in scenes shot for other films just before his death in 1956.

According to her son, McCarty met Wood on a studio lot when she was working on the CBS series Gunsmoke, and they were wed on a soundstage in October 1955. Weeks later, Wood admitted to her that he was a cross-dresser, and she, with two young sons at the time, booted him from their home.

“I’d find my nightgown on the bed when I got home from work and said, ‘I didn’t wear that last night.’ But it never dawned on me that he might be wearing these things,” McCarty said in an interview for a 1999 installment of the series E! Mysteries & Scandals.

It has been widely reported over the years that McCarty had the marriage annulled and that Wood went on to marry actress Kathleen O’Hara, who was in Wood's Night of the Ghouls (1959). But film archivist Wade Williams, who told THR that he now owns the copyright to five Wood films, said he had close ties to all three and that McCarty was legally Wood’s wife until the filmmaker's death in December 1978.

O’Hara was portrayed by Patricia Arquette in Tim Burton’s 1994 movie Ed Wood, based on a book by Rudolph Grey. McCarty was not represented in the film adaptation, which starred Johnny Depp as Wood.

McCarty was born Dec. 18, 1920, in Arkansas and grew up in Kansas City, Mo. In the 1940s, she moved to Manhattan Beach, Calif., and was hired by Eagle Lion Studios to work the switchboard and then served as a receptionist for MGM.

She also appeared on such series as Perry Mason, Superman, That Girl and The Andy Griffith Show, her son said.

Survivors include her other son, John.

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Beyonce Sings to Jay Z in HBO's 'On the Run' Trailer

The concert special is set to premiere on Sept. 20

Invision for Parkwood Entertainment

HBO has released a seductive new trailer for its upcoming concert special for Beyonce and Jay Z’s On the Run tour.

The 50-second clip begins in classic black-and-white style with Beyonce on stage singing the Sonny Bono-penned 1966 song "Bang Bang (My Baby Shot Me Down)" to Jay Z, who is seated and smoking a cigar.

The trailer explodes from there into high-octane performance footage of the couple’s On the Run tour, which recently wrapped in North America and will gross more than $100 million in ticket sales.

The premium cable channel announced that On the Run Tour: Beyonce and Jay Z will premiere Sept. 20 at 9 p.m. ET/PT.

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Watch Will Smith, DJ Jazzy Jeff Reunite in Vegas for 'Summertime' Surprise

The actor also led dancing dayclub-goers through Sugarhill Gang's "Apache"

Chris Pizzello/Invision/AP

Will Smith

Will Smith hit Las Vegas on Friday for a "Summertime" surprise.

The actor stopped by the Palms Pool and Dayclub to join his longtime friend and collaborator DJ Jazzy Jeff for a performance of their 1991 anthem.

"You all know how to party down here!" he told the crowd, noting that he hadn't seen Jeff in seven months. "We haven't been onstage in forever!"

After removing his shirt midsong, Smith then proceeded to "jump on it" with the crowd during Sugarhill Gang's "Apache."

Watch the performance clips below, via TMZ.

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Colombian Helmer-Producer Oscar Ruiz Navia Talks About ‘Los hongos’

August 10, 2014 | 04:44AM PT

“Los hongos,” Ruiz Navia's second directorial outing, world preems in Locarno's Filmmakers of the Present section

Emiliano De Pablos

Founder of Colombian outfit Contravia Films, Oscar Ruiz Navia’s acclaimed directorial debut, “Crab Trap,” was Colombia’s first ever Oscar candidate and won a Fipresci Prize at the 2009 Berlin festival. Ruiz Navia’s helming follow-up, coming-of-age tale “Los hongos” – chronicling two adolescents’ passion for street art – world preems Tuesday at Switzerland’s Locarno Festival’s Filmmakers of the Present sidebar. The Cali-born filmmaker (pictured) talked to Variety about his newest film, a Colombia-France-Germany-Argentina co-production, which FiGa Films is selling internationally.

SEE MORE: Locarno Film Festival

In “Los hongos” there is a blend of a Colombian specific social context with a treatment that is not a straight-arrow realism, normally focusing on the characters’ emotional journey. Is there the idea that the psychology is universal despite that social context?

Right. “Los hongos” is an urban movie focused on the story of two young people from different social origins who have linked up via graffiti art. This means the film somehow isn’t necessarily focused on major conflicts but rather on situations that are very typical of teenagers, linked to a very specific context in Colombia, even Cali. In the case of “Los hongos,” the film aims to frame conflicts teenagers experience everywhere – love, a lack of money, the need to express themselves, freedom, rebelliousness… And I think that can make the film work in many contexts.

Can you describe the film’s aesthetic?

Strictly in aesthetic terms, there is a bet on finding a language that comes out of the narrative, exploring other types of issues. For example, we wanted to develop a graffiti piece and called real graffiti artists, asking them to paint and act for the camera. With other films we’re producing at Contravia such as William Vega’s “Sal” and Angela Osorio and Santiago Lozano’s “Siembra,” “Los hongos” has in common the desire that our raw material shiuld be reality itself, but not necessarily that reality is represented in a realistic way, but more in a poetic fashion. I say that “Los hongos” is a documentary dream.

What is the meaning of “documentary dream”?

I like working in a limbo between something I can control and something that is out of my total control. Although I always had a script up the sleeve, I constantly adapted it to the non-professional actors with whom I worked. In fact, they all are named in fiction as they are named in real life. My fascination for reality does not translate into realism, but on building from contemporary inputs a kind of sensation that is closer to a daydream. I try to give priority to the poetic rather than narrative, investigating the life, evoking memories or putting in front the camera desires that have only happened in my imagination. Then there are things that are out of my hands, and only happen because the people who are there have their own nature.

What are your ambitions at the Locarno festival?

Locarno is becoming the temple of worldwide film fans, with an exquisite and rigorous programming, whereby to have been selected is already in itself a major achievement for the film. We want “Los hongos” to be seen by a large audience and generate a debate about the universes that it explores.

What connections exist between “Los hongos” and your directorial debut, “Crab Trap”?

There are new questions, almost five years have gone by, but I really think they have a lot in common: the desire for freedom, their characters’ rebelliousness and miscegenation, to say a few things. What I like in the movies is to displace the essence of the universes I choose. And this film, like “Crab Trap,” are faithful to the research I made over a long time. “Los hongos” is a much less minimalist film because the city of Cali, where the film was shot, is a complex place, of many colors and aromas.

John Hopewell contributed to this report

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SXSW ’14 Interview: Leigh Janiak
on Plotting the Unforgettably
Terrifying “Honeymoon”

As a kid, “Honeymoon” director Leigh Janiak would spend her summers in Canada, going up to her relative’s idyllic cabin by the lake. While peace and serenity were always promised, often all she would hear were the screaming of little frogs.

“That traumatized me as a kid,” recalls Janiak, who with her production designer Chris Trujillo, partially modeled the cottage in her first horror film after her old summer stomping grounds, from the lacquered wood-paneled walls to the gigantic bear rug that hangs from one of them. “My parents actually went there on their honeymoon and [when they saw the film], they’re like ‘No, no, that’s not what our honeymoon was like.’”

One would hope not, though when “Honeymoon” begins, it would be hard to imagine a happier couple than Bea (Rose Leslie) and Paul (Harry Treadaway), newlyweds so eager to enjoy marital bliss that as they race to their hideaway the customary soup cans nearly fall off their car. Yet the corroded cans are just a hint of things to come for the pair, who quickly discover that “til death do us part” may come a little sooner than expected when Bea begins to exhibit some erratic behavior.

Rather than siccing a machete-wielding maniac in the woods or some creature from the lake on the couple, Janiak and longtime writing partner Phil Graziadei tap into a more existential fear of never really being able to fully know another person, even if they’re the one you commit to spending the rest of your life with. The result is as nerve-jangling for an audience as it is for pool Paul after “Honeymoon” induces you to fall in love with its characters as much as they are with each other at first, especially when the sense of internal dread manifests itself into the physical world of the film.

“Game of Thrones” star Leslie and Treadaway’s performances vividly bring the couple to life and while it’s Janiak’s job to plot their demise, her consideration for them and a story that burrows in deep, combined with considerable skill, leads to one of the most unshakeable experiences imaginable, not to mention fun as hell. The morning after the film’s premiere at SXSW, I was lucky enough to sit down with Janiak, who appears as excited to talk about movies as Bea does about her beloved in “Honeymoon”’s opening minutes and shared the two South By films that pushed her to make her first feature, how the actors’ different approaches to their characters helped the film and forging a new path of her own towards horror.

There’s a rumor was a fight between film festival programmers over this film and because I’ve heard “Tiny Furniture” and “Monsters” were influential, did that give SXSW the edge?

Yeah, completely. My writing partner had been writing scripts forever. We met when we were in undergraduate at NYU and we were living in LA. I had a good day job working for a production company, where I met my current producers and I was reading scripts and having time to also write, then it was wearing me down a bit. Like, “How old am I going to be before I actually get to make a movie?” Writing a script is great, but it’s only so satisfying in the end. I love movies. I don’t love scripts.

In 2009, I wasn’t at South By, but I saw “Tiny Furniture” and “Monsters.” I don’t know why those movies specifically, but I was definitely drawn to Tiny Furniture because there just aren’t a lot of female filmmakers, period, and Lena managed to break through in a really powerful way and I went to NYU, so I loved the New York part of it. Then “Monsters” just blew my mind because it’s amazing. It’s just unbelievable that somebody could make that quality genre movie that price. It felt exciting and exactly like the kind of movie that I’d like to make someday.

You’ve said that you wrote “Honeymoon” knowing that you’d have a film at the end of it, so how did the budget limitations you set for yourself inform it?

It’s interesting because I wouldn’t say that the end goal necessarily motivated the content of the script, because it didn’t. It was more just as we were writing we were aware of certain constraints that we may have. We tried to keep our locations limited. The idea was that hopefully we’d use those limitations to our advantage.

After the screening you spoke broadly about one of my favorite ideas of the film, the notion of beautiful things that can also be interpreted as terrible if seen in a different light. If you listen closely, that seems to be embedded into the film’s dialogue right from the introduction of the house and I wondered if that tone was difficult to pull off verbally.

Obviously capturing tone in the script is very different than on screen. There was always a line that we were walking, especially when we were in production. I had a lot of conversations with Rose and Harry, and the main thing that I imparted was that we don’t get to see a lot of movies about a couple that are genuinely happy. There’s always problems like the guy is always cheating on the woman, or da-da-da-da-da.

I really wanted them to be happy in the beginning, and you can feel the rest of the world and all of the sadness seeping in. There just had to be this sense of contamination and decay the whole time. We ramped it up as the movie went on, but it was definitely there in the beginning.

What was so striking is that this is a horror film without the usual scare tactics such as jump cuts or overreliance on Foley artists, but you often do it with language and because you fall in love with the characters, when things go bad, it feels akin to watching a close relative as they age in a less than graceful way. Was that actually an influence?

Completely. Did you see “Amour”? When I watched that movie, the script for “Honeymoon” was already done and we were in pre-production. But watching that couple fall apart, and seeing the person that you love and you think you know so well turn into a complete stranger… “Amour” did it so perfectly in such a grounded way, and I wanted Paul and Bea’s relationship like that as well. To your point that it’s not full of jump scares or crazy Foley sounds, I thought that we could do it. It would be great to just see, feel it in the tone of voice or in the way that their gazes at each other change.

You seemed to suggest that the difference in the acting styles of your two leads was something you could take advantage of in terms of their relationship onscreen. How so?

Initially, it was very stressful. You have essentially only two people in the movie. Ben Huber, who played Will, and Hanna Brown who played Annie, were awesome but they were in limited scenes. This was Harry and Rose’s movie. When they arrived, we had a good five days of intense time together. We basically just went though the script and talked through the characters and motivations. We didn’t actually rehearse the scenes. And [their styles were] very, very different, and I maybe speaking out of turn, but this is just what I noticed from an outsider’s view. Harry completely embodies the character and really worked from the inside out, and Rose is very much like, “This character exists outside of me, and I’m going to dissect it and that’s how I’m going to get to know her.”

I think that it helped completely what their different characters were, because [Treadaway's character] Paul is completely enveloped in his world and it’s really hard for him to get a grasp of what’s beyond. Things just start falling apart for him. For her, she’s becoming increasingly disassociated from who she is in the world as she is losing her humanity.‎ Whether or not that was a decision on Rose’s part to play with Harry a bit, I don’t know, but it’s brilliant if it was because it really shows.

Was this one of those shoots where you actually were isolated from the rest of the world and might get a little cabin fever?

I had a lot of anxiety when we were location scouting. We shot in this place called Hendersonville, Flat Rock, North Carolina. It’s an amazing place, but someone told me after we arrived in North Carolina that North Carolina doesn’t have any natural lakes. I started freaking out because that’s not what Canada looks like. We found this great lake in this small little town, and we were able to put the whole crew up there.‎ I stayed in a house with my [cinematographer] right on the lake, which was great because we were like 10 minutes from set but also we could drive anytime we wanted to get food at night.

Still, I’m not going to lie, I get the creeps when I’m out in the woods. I very much like being in a city. After a week or so, I started hearing things outside and totally freaking myself out. So the cabin fever, definitely.

Much is being made of the fact that you’re a rare female filmmaker who made a genre film, which I think should be celebrated, but are you comfortable with that being something people are focusing on?

It’s so weird. I don’t ever think about, “Oh, I’m a woman, high five,” at all. At the same time, I increasingly became aware, especially after making a movie and actually going through the process of it, of how few women there are not just in the genre space, but on the production side of film in general. There are a lot more on the development side.‎ So I’m certainly proud that I’m a woman and that I get to do this, and that people are recognizing that that is a slightly different point of view. You can say that point of view varies from filmmaker to filmmaker whatever your gender is, but I get it and I’m happy to embrace it.

If people get excited about there being more women in the genre space, that women that can do this, then you feel they’ll make their own opportunities too. It’s not just about the system saying we feel uncomfortable with women making horror movies. We have to make those decisions too because it’s what I love, so I’m going to make this.

Now, Magnet Releasing is preparing for the September 12th.

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SXSW 2014 Review: HONEYMOON Is All Parts Scare

Ryland Aldrich, Festivals Editor

12

From Honeymoon's opening montage of our newlywed couple reminiscing about falling in love, you might think you are settling in for romantic drama about the challenges of starting a life together. You'd be wrong. While plenty of challenges await our young lovers at their lakeside getaway, they're not of a typical marriage quarrel nature. No, something is very wrong at this idyllic cabin in the woods. Is there something supernatural afoot, or is there a more logical explanation? While it wouldn't be right to reveal that information, it would be very wrong not to point out how impressive this debut feature from Leigh Janiak is. Honeymoon is a taut thriller that very quickly gets up to full speed - and once there, plunges the audience face first into the realm of terror.

The aforementioned newlyweds Bea and Paul are played by Rose Leslie and Harry Treadaway. Leslie will be immediately recognizable to TV fans from her roles on Game of Thrones and Downton Abbey. Treadaway is perhaps best known to indie film-goers as the challenger to Michael Fassbender in Fish Tank. Here they've both shed their Old Country accents for an American lilt and nary a stray syllable is detectable. They're also quite good actors and very convincing as two people fully in love.

This love has propelled their relationship and while we don't get all that much detail, it would seem that the couple's marriage was personal, small, and perhaps somewhat quickly planned affair. Their honeymoon is just as austere; a week at Bea's family's lake house well before the summer crowds have arrived. It doesn't take long for this plan to hit a speed bump as Bea runs into an old teenage fling whose strange behavior and effect on Bea throws Paul off guard. This is quickly followed by some mysterious lights and a sleepwalking episode that leaves both Paul and the audience thinking not everything is okay with Bea.

While the scares will surely have you clutching your armrest, they work so well because they are always earned. When Bea starts acting really strange, Paul doesn't just ignore it and wait for the proverbial knife to find his back like some films might do. Instead he gets proactive and tries to get to the bottom of what is going on. This has the effect of causing a rift between the two, and as Paul starts to get more aggressive, we start to wonder if maybe something is wrong with him too.

Janiak does an admirable job of keeping the audience off guard without letting things feel manipulated. She is obviously a student of horror, but uses this to know what not to do, just as much as what works. But don't be scared away by thinking this is a kind of movie like Cabin in the Woods that riffs on the tropes of the horror genre. Honeymoon is very much its own beast; a good story, excellently told, and very, very scary.

Mariah Carey Tour 2014: 'Thirsty' Singer Announces The Elusive Chanteuse Show Dates in Asia in Support of New Album

Mariah Carey(Photo : Andrew H. Walker/Getty Images)

By Carolyn Menyes
Aug 18, 2014 10:23 AM EDT

Mariah Carey may have billed herself as Me. I Am Mariah... The El... Chanteuse on her latest record, but by the end of the year, she will be right in the spotlight. Today (Aug. 18), the "Thirsty" singer announced a round of tour dates in support of her new album, The Elusive Chanteuse Show, and she'll be kicking things off in Asia.

According to Idolator, The Elusive Chanteuse Show will kick off on Oct. 4 in Tokyo, with subsequent shows in Japan, China, Malaysia, Singapore and the Philippines. Though just nine shows in Asia have been announced so far, more dates in Europe and North America are expected to be announced in the next few weeks.

Check out the first dates of Mariah Carey's The Elusive Chanteuse Show below:

10/04: Tokyo, JP@ Makuhari Messe Arena
10/06: Yokohama, JP @ Yokohama Arena
10/10: Beijing, CN @ Workers' Stadium
10/12: Chengdu, CN @ Chengdu Stadium
10/15: Chongqing, CN @ Olympic Center
10/19: Shanghai, CN @ Hongku Stadium
10/22: Kuala Lumpur, MY @ Stadium Merdeka
10/24: Kallang, SG @ Singapoor Indoor Stadium
10/28: Manila, PH @ Mall of Asia Arena

So, what is there to expect for The Elusive Chanteuse Show? According to a press release, Carey will be performing a mix of new material, old fan favorites and even some new songs. "I can't stop writing songs, so don't be surprised if you hear a brand new song that I just wrote the night before the show in your city," she said.

Carey's tour is in support of her latest album, Me. I Am Mariah... The Elusive Chanteuse, which was finally released in May after years of delays. The record is has been led by singles "#Beautiful," "The Art of Letting Go," "You're Mine (Eternal)" and "You Don't Know What To Do."

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John Mellencamp To Releas...ptember 23

Posted by Navi 14Aug

John Mellencamp will release, Plain Spoken on September 23, 2014, the 22nd full-length album and first release for Republic Records.

Plain Spoken includes ten Americana gems from "The Voice of the Heartland." Mellencamp, while celebrating his skill not just as a song craftsman but as a world-class entertainer. On its release in September, Plain Spoken will be available in a 10-track edition on CD, vinyl and download. Lead track, "Troubled Man" is available on iTunes August 19 and impacts radio on September 8.

Plain Spoken commences on the acoustic guitar hum of "Troubled Man" as Mellencamp carries a pensive and poetic chorus. Organ and harmonica punctuate "The Isolation of Mister" with a sense of vibrancy, while "Tears In Vain" features a twanging guitar solo and the singer's unmistakable delivery. The haunting and heartbreaking beauty of "Blue Charlotte" lingers with emotion. There is "The Courtesy of Kings", which is driven by banjo and Mellencamp's poignant lyrics and the bluesy swing of the album's conclusion "Lawless Times" where his cinematic lyrics bristle with energy matched only by the six-string screech. Plain Spoken is set to be hailed as an unparalleled new chapter in Mellencamp's distinctive songbook.

Plain Spoken is the first album from the Rock and Roll Hall of Famer since 2010's critically acclaimed, No Better Than This—which landed in the Top 10 of Billboard's Top 200 during release week and garnered the honor of becoming one of Rolling Stone's "Best Albums of 2010". Mellencamp has touched the heart and souls of music listeners and influenced American Culture with enduring songs, he is also one of the most successful live concert performers in the world. A man with a conscience, he used his visibility and influence to advocate an issue that hit close to home and became one of the founding members of Farm Aid, an organization that began in 1985 to raise awareness about the loss of family farm. The Farm Aid concerts have raised over $45 million to promote a resilient family farm system of agriculture.

TRACKLISTING:

Troubled Man
Sometimes There's God
The Isolation of Mister
The Company of Cowards
Tears In Vain
The Brass Ring
Freedom Of Speech
Blue Charlotte
The Courtesy of Kings
Lawless Times

- See more at: http://emptylighthouse.co...W1VaG.dpuf

Sophie Cookson

By Chris Wallace

Photography Mikael Jansson

Last spring, 24-year-old Sophie Cookson was in her third year as a drama student in her native England. Then, along came Kick-Ass (2010) auteur Matthew Vaughn, who, despite reported interest from Emma Watson and other known-knowns, cast Cookson in the lead role of The Secret Service, his adaptation of the action-espionage comic series, alongside a league of extraordinary gentleman, including Colin Firth, Samuel L. Jackson, and Michael Caine. After meeting Cookson at a café in the West Village in April, it is easy to see why. In person, the actress is warm and bright and incredibly at ease for someone who is about to be famous overnight—and not only because she was sitting on the sunny side of our table.

CHRIS WALLACE: Do you feel like your whole life is changing?

SOPHIE COOKSON: I was training at drama school for three years, working hard for this. I left drama school early to do a job in May, and by August, I was involved in things. So it was very quick. I've had a bit of time to get my head around it, but it's still mental seeing pictures of me and Michael Caine in the same room. "Did that happen? Yeah, it did."

WALLACE: Is this what you always wanted?

COOKSON: I've always wanted to act, but I never dreamed I'd be doing something like this [a blockbuster-scale film with worldwide release].

WALLACE: What were you into as a kid?

COOKSON: I was really sporty and loved singing. I started off doing musical theater. I left university to go to drama school. So I was a bit of a black sheep.

WALLACE: Everybody loves to bring up the fact that Matthew Vaughn cast you in The Secret Service instead of Emma Watson. Why do you think you got the part?

COOKSON: Because Matthew knows what he wants—I think it's that simple. Matthew's eye for detail is crystal clear. He did it with Aaron Taylor-Johnson and Chloë Grace Moretz [who were relative unknowns when he cast them in Kick-Ass]. A lot of people want someone they feel in safe hands with and know that they have a history of work behind them, but Matthew knows what he wants and he goes and gets it. I wasn't aware of the people I was possibly up against, and it was such a long shot. I got an e-mail saying, "Do you want to put yourself on tape for this film with Colin Firth?" Okay. It wasn't like I had anything to lose.

WALLACE: What is your worst nightmare? Clearly it's not auditioning.

COOKSON: I always have this weird falling sensation. I used to be terrified of a particular film—I can't remember what it was called. It was set in a forest, and there was lots of oil coming from trees. And someone fell, and ever since then ... Oh, and I also dream about my teeth, losing a tooth, which I think means that you want control back.

WALLACE: Do you feel out of control?

COOKSON: No, I feel fine. But I know if I'm stressed or worried, because I'll have that dream again.

WALLACE: Do you have any pet peeves?

COOKSON: People being rude. I love the English people—if you don't want to speak, you don't speak. And I'm quite like that sometimes, too. But there is something very nice about coming to New York and how everyone smiles—even if they don't mean it. When I go back home to London and say hello to people, they look at me like I'm crazy.

WALLACE: Heaven help you when you visit L.A. Do you have a model for the career path you'd like to follow?

COOKSON: There's a British actress called Lindsay Duncan, whom I adore. She just did Le Week-End [2013] with Jim Broadbent. She picks her roles very cleverly. She's done a lot of theater—there's a lot of dignity about the way she works, and that's definitely something I aspire to. I want to take things as they come and enjoy it. There's no point looking down the line because no one knows what's going to happen tomorrow, let alone four years from now.

WALLACE: Did any of your Secret Service co-stars give you any really good advice?

COOKSON: Mark Strong is an amazing person. I just kind of enjoyed watching him. And that's really nice being on set—just watching someone do their thing. He is just so calm, dedicated, professional, and an absolute gent as well.

WALLACE: Is there a classic movie that you wish you were in?

COOKSON: I'd say Gone With the Wind [1939], just because it would make my grandma very proud. But, Breakfast at Tiffany's [1961], just to be Audrey Hepburn for a day.

WALLACE: Did you have an imaginary friend growing up?

COOKSON: I did. But it's one of those things where I don't remember if I really remember or if I've just been told about it and decided I remember it. We used to have this driveway with a five-bar wooden gate, and I, apparently, as a three-year-old, would sit on the wooden gates and just talk to this old woman.

WALLACE: Where did you grow up?

COOKSON: I grew up in Sussex. I moved to Suffolk, but then I went to drama school at the Oxford School of Drama, which is gorgeous because it's really secluded, with no distractions. Then in your third year, you go to London and have your showcase.

WALLACE: Did you have intense relationships with your classmates?

COOKSON: You can't help it at such a small school. There were 17 people in my year. And you're with those people from seven in the morning to 11 sometimes, five days a week, the weekends, for three years. It's sometimes quite hard when you slip back into the real world and you realize that you are all there for a reason, ultimately. You want a job at the end of it; you do want to be working.

WALLACE: It's probably good preparation for set life, because that's how relationships are on productions.

COOKSON: It's true, and true in life. Sometimes relationships are short, sometimes long, sometimes they're very deep and intense, and drama school is a hell of a learning curve.

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TORONTO: Sophie Cookson Starring Opposite Adrien Brody in ‘Emperor’

Dave J Hogan/Getty Image

August 18, 2014 | 01:00PM PT

Dave McNary

Film Reporter @Variety_DMcNary

In a pre-Toronto Film Festival move, British actress Sophie Cookson has come on board opposite Adrien Brody in historical action-adventure “Emperor.”

Other cast members in “Emperor,” directed by Lee Tamahori, include Paz Vega (“Talk to Her”), Gotz Otto (“Cloud Atlas”) Bill Skarsgard (“Anna Karenina”), Thomas Kretschmann (“Valkyrie”), Oliver Platt and Rutger Hauer.

Eddie Marsan is in talks for a role and Belgian actors Sam Louwyck, Michael Pas and Lize Feryn (“The White Queen”) complete the cast.

The project was announced at Cannes with Brody and Tamahori attached. Shooting starts Sept. 1 in Prague and Ghent.

Producers are Courson NV topper Paul Breuls, Michael John Fedun and Catherine Vandeleene. Guy Tannahill is exec producing and Richard McCallum serves as co-producer.

The script is written by Michael Thomas III (“The Devil’s Double”) and Jeffrey Hatcher (“The Duchess”). Cookson plays a feisty and daring 21-year-old who infiltrates the court of Holy Roman Emperor Charles V (Brody) to avenge the death of her father at a time when the emperor is struggling to hold together a fragmented empire in a world of wealth, debauchery, intrigue and treason.

Cookson will soon be seen as the female lead opposite Samuel L. Jackson, Michael Caine and Colin Firth in Matthew Vaughn’s “Kingsman: The Secret Service.”

International sales are being handled by Corsan at the Toronto Film Festival. U.S. sales are being handled by Paradigm, which represents Corsan.

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Paul Giamatti Joins N.W.A. Biopic 'Straight Outta Compton'

Paul Giamatti will play N.W.A.'s manager and Ruthless Records co-founder Jerry Heller in Universal Pictures' biopic 'Straight Outta Compton'.

Aug 18, 2014 by Brian Gallagher

With the five main members of pioneering rap group N.W.A. already set, the biopic Straight Outta Compton has added Paul Giamatti as N.W.A. manager and Ruthless Records co-founder Jerry Heller.

The story follows five young rappers from Compton, who channeled their harsh upbringing into their revolutionary music, as they pioneered the "gangsta rap" genre and became one of the most important rap groups in music history. Jason Mitchell is playing Eazy-E, O'Shea Jackson Jr. is portraying Ice Cube (his real life father), and Corey Antonio Hawkins is set to portray Dr. Dre, with Aldis Hodge and Neil Brown Jr. rounding out the main cast as M.C. Ren and DJ Yella.

Paul Giamatti is playing the group's manager Jerry Heller, who co-founded the Ruthless Records label with Eazy-E and oversaw their rise to stardom. However, when the band broke up after Ice Cube and Dr. Dre left, Jerry Heller was blamed by many for the band's disbanding for mishandling their funds. Before managing N.W.A., Jerry Heller worked with a number of other musical groups such as Journey, Electric Light Orchestra and REO Speedwagon, while working on Pink Floyd and Elton John's early American tours.

F. Gary Gray is directing Straight Outta Compton from a script by Andrea Berloff, S. Leigh Savidge and Alan Wenkus. Original N.W.A. members Ice Cube and Dr. Dre are both producing alongside Matt Alvarez and Tomica Woods-Wright, with William Packer and Scott Bernstein serving as executive producers. Production is currently under way in Los Angeles.

Paul Giamatti most recently starred in The Amazing Spider-Man 2 and The Congress.

Straight Outta Compton comes to theaters August 14th, 2015 and stars Jason Mitchell, Corey Antonio Hawkins, Aldis Hodge, Neil Brown Jr., Paul Giamatti. The film is directed by F. Gary Gray.

Cantinflas: 106 Minutes of Wonder

Posted by admin on August 12th, 2014 11:37 PM

By Judi Jordan

Notoriously hands-on, the presence of Mario Moreno AKA “Cantinflas” was felt by all during the curiously smooth production of the upcoming film that bears his name. Director Sebastian de Amo agrees that this film shoot was aided by unseen forces that kept them “on time and on budget, made it rain, told the Mexican sun when to shine “ and imbued the cast and crew with his extraordinary energy through 15-hour days. The lovable “pelado” was looking over the shoulder of Oscar Jaenada, the film’s star, who confessed “I got goose bumps sometimes.” Others agreed something ‘special’ was afoot. “It was a perfect shoot”, marveled producers Vidal Cantú and Adolfo Franco of Kenio Films, the production company behind Cantinflas. Indeed, the fairytale quality of the film reeks of movie magic, of the “good old days” when Dolores del Rio, Maria Felix and Lupita Tovar were stars, and Latin glamour reigned.

Mario Moreno as his beloved character “Cantinflas”

To watch director del Amo’s Cantinflas, starring gifted Spanish actor Jaenada, is to be transported back in time to a world of fantasy, where a poor nobody from a Mexican barrio can become a world-famous star and producer—and more –a “brand” recognized world-wide—all done without the internet!! Imagine that! A star who rose from the absolute bottom to the highest heavens on his own unique genius —with no TV, no Twitter, no Instagram, no Facebook, no ‘selfies’ — just talent, (OK, a lot of it) solid survival instincts, and creative self-possession. Yes, I am talking Mario Moreno “Cantinflas”, the biggest Latino star to date—in terms of lasting fame and the sheer volume of films he starred in. He was partly responsible for creating the ‘Golden Age’ of Mexican cinema, and del Amo’s homage never forgets this—it celebrates it.

Suspended in a time machine that surfs between storytelling and recreation of movie-making magic, Cantinflas delights and inspires as it informs. It fills in details of Moreno’s broom-pushing beginnings and builds its story on the relentless hustle by legendary producer Mike Todd to get his all-star cast for Around the World in Eighty Days. The original “event” movie, 80 Days had a record number of 40 cameos including Elizabeth Taylor, Marlene Dietrich, George Raft, and Frank Sinatra.

Promotional material of the film released at the time quoted a Screen Actors Guild representative, looking at the call sheet, crying out, “Good heavens Todd, you’ve made extras out of all the stars in Hollywood!” The role of Passepartout the quirky valet, was greatly expanded from the original novel to accommodate Cantinflas, the most famous Latin American comedian in the world, and he became the focus of the film. The film made Moreno a world-famous star, garnered him a Golden Globe, and made $42 million at the box office—adjusted to 2014 dollars that’s $355 million for the bean counters.

Oscar Jaenada promoting the film

When the film was released in non-English-speaking nations, Cantinflas was billed as the lead. Todd had trouble convincing Cantinflas, who had never before appeared in an American movie and had turned down countless offers, to do so. On playing the part of Passepartout, Cantinflas was quoted as saying”…to my audience in Latin America, I’ll still be Cantinflas.”

Born in August of 1911 [as Mario Fortino Alfonso Moreno Reyes], Moreno struggled considerably before he hit his stride. But when he ‘found’ his gift and magic formula – the character Cantinflas — he held on tight and never let it go. Between 1936 and 1981 he starred in 50 movies and all but three were made in Mexico. Most were directed by the same director—Miguel M. Delgado.

During his lifetime Moreno became politically active — in defense of the underdog he came to embody in Cantinflas. He was a brilliant business man as well. When he died in 1993 at 81, his net worth was $25 million. Yes, Cantinflas was a millionaire many times over, and he lived like a king. He kept five homes and his Mexico City digs housed an extensive art collection, a swimming pool, a bowling alley, a jai alai court, a theater, barber and beauty salons. He even flew his own jet to his 1,000-acre ranch, La Purisima, where he raised bulls.

He was also famous for his charity. Legend has it he handed out $175,000 a year to crowds of people who lined up daily at his door. At one time he was supporting more than 250 destitute families in the Mexico City barrio of Granjas. There he later built 64 apartment houses and sold the units to the poor for a fraction of their value. Cantinflas raised funds for charity by appearing at dozens of benefits every year. His annual performances as a wacky comedic bullfighter, always packed the 46,000-seat Plaza Mexico in Mexico City which are depicted in the film. Idolized in Mexico to an extent rarely seen anymore, Cantinflas was smack in the center of Diego Rivera’s mural in 1951 depicting great heroes in Mexican history. Not bad for a poor boy, the sixth of 8 children from Tepito, Ciudad de México.

Director de Amo (El fantastic mundo de Juan Oro) takes the remarkable talents of Jaenada, Michael Imperioli (The Sopranos, Goodfellows) as Mike Todd, and Ilse Salas (Locas de amor) as Valentina, Moreno’s adored and betrayed Russian wife, and weaves a compelling tale of ambition fulfilled, at a price.

Cantinflas is loaded with cool cameos by top Latino stars including the gorgeous Barbara Mori as Elizabeth Taylor and Ximena Gonzalez-Rubio. That and the fresh set design, beautiful costumes and music add charm and elegant nostalgia. Still, it was done on a tight budget. For $3.5 million this is one amazing movie. Admittedly, many of the well-known Latino actors portraying famous stars worked for extras’ “scale” pay just to be part of the film, echoing the casting of major stars in Around the World in 80 Days.

Jaenada clearly put everything he had into his portrayal of Mario and his alter ego Cantinflas – as dual characters. “I worked for six months to be Cantinflas—and Mario Moreno. “ Jaenada got the ultimate compliment from Moreno’s son who told him he “heard my father’s voice” through Jaenada. The chemistry between Jaenada and Salas is compelling and layered, and the bittersweet love story is well played. A perfect lesson in self-empowerment, Cantinflas follows the edict of Kenio Films whose mandate for uplifting, positive productions made for Latino audiences promises a ‘new wave’ and possibly a renaissance of Mexico’s Golden Age.

“Ahi esta el detalle” – Cantinflas gave his seal of approval on the final day of shooting, as del Amo recounts, “Cantinflas’ lucky number was seven; one of his famous characters was “Badge Number 777”. The day we wrapped the film we looked at the clock and realized it was July 7th at 7 PM.” The film’s final edit comes to 1 hour 6 minutes. 6 1= Homage.

In Theaters August 29th. Spanish and English subtitles.

Cantinflas is distributed by Lionsgate/Pantelion

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Robert Rodriguez In “The Directors Chair”

Posted by admin on August 12th, 2014 11:51 PM

“I started off as an actor and actually the only training I’ve ever done has been as an actor. I always knew that that would be one of my biggest strengths…dealing with actors, and writing the characters and getting the best of them and being able to talk actor talk.”- Quentin Tarantino

This past July, as soon as El Rey Network founder Robert Rodriguez completed his participation in the Television Critics Association (TCA) press panel for El Rey’s new series, Matador he gleefully launches into a discussion about The Directors Chair, his mano a mano interview series with notable directors, focusing on the world of filmmaking. His debut interview with Guillermo Del Toro aired July 30. But what has Rodriguez particularly excited today is his two-part session with his frequent collaborator, Quentin Tarantino, which airs Wednesday, August 13 (Vol. 1) and August 27 (Vol. 2) at 9pm (ET/PT) on the El Rey Network.

Rodriguez exclaims, “I’ve been preparing for this interview for 22 years. I have footage of Tarantino going back that far. And I’ve kept study journals that were just a continuation of my book, Rebel Without a Crew. I can say things down to the date and time he said things that turned out ten years later to come true or that would surprise people that he’s forgotten. I have video footage of all kinds of stuff from his first time we did a panel discussion together too. When he was writing Pulp Fiction, I was writing Desperado in the same offices next to each other.”

Rodriguez’s fluency in the world of Tarantino could almost be likened to worshipful stalking, including Rodriguez informally videotaping his friend reading and acting out scenes from early drafts of Kill Bill nine years before it was made, followed by Tarantino’s videotaped reading from a more polished script six years later. Rodriguez believes he is delving into a creative process that no one else would be able to do on an interview show like this.

“A lot of it is coming from me having an overview of someone’s career, having knowledge of things I still don’t know the answer to. I sort of want to probe their minds, kind of like a detective, to piece together why they got where they are. I have been friends with Guillermo del Toro since he began. But it was only through that televised conversation—distilled from a three-hour interview—that I truly learned who he is, the kind of decisions he made early on and the ones he continues to make.”

Rodriguez points out that he talks a lot about failure, a subject that elicits strong responses from the directors he interviews. He affirms that is usually the most important film in a director’s cannon because it informs how they work from then on. He reveals, “That’s when you can really structure together their creative story. So, a lot of it are things that I generally want to know that I also know it would be useful to an audience.

“It is very inspiring to an audience to hear some of these revelations that no one has heard before, things that previously only I was privy to, that I can pinpoint and say, ‘This happened then. Why?’ And, then, it really shows the process and the mystery of the process and how nobody knows really how something can turn out. But in hindsight, we can piece it together. As for me, I am so glad I kept such thorough diaries and that I have such connections with a lot of the filmmakers.”

El Rey Network Presents: The Director’s Chair is produced by Troublemaker Studios and Skip Film in association with FactoryMade Ventures. Executive producers are Robert Rodriguez, Skip Chaisson, John Fogelman and Cristina Patwa.

El Rey Network is a new 24-hour English language network founded by filmmaker Robert Rodriguez. Curated by Rodriguez and his artistic collective, the network’s action-packed content is anchored by original signature dramas, feature films, grindhouse genre, cult classic action, and horror/sci-fi.

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Al Bravo Studios Release “2 Bedroom 1 Bath” Opens Sept. 5th

Posted by admin on August 18th, 2014 03:05 PM

Writer/Directors Kevin Kolsch and Dennis Widmyer, Producer Travis Stevens, and Star Alex Essoe talk Starry Eyes [INTERVIEW] [SXSW '14]

I saw Starry Eyes relatively early into South by Southwest, and I knew I really liked it as soon as I walked out of it. The further away I got from having seen it, the more I liked it. When I finally spoke to the filmmakers, they pointed out some inspirations and references that hadn’t even dawned on me yet, solidifying the film as one of my favorites of the entire festival. Kevin Kolsch and Dennis Widmyer have some big concepts and high standards, so expect to see more really cool stuff from them in the future. Travis Stevens was producer on two of the biggest festival hits of last year, Cheap Thrills and Jodorowsky’s Dune, so I know his hot streak is only going to continue with this and future films. Alex Essoe was vulnerable, empowered, frantic and confident in her performance as Sarah, an actress questioning how far she’d be willing to go to obtain her dream. Guys…just go see the fucking movie. There’s no official release date planned, but keep you eyes out for it. It…gets real weird, and in the best ways possible. I think you’ll understand that once you read this cool interview! Reading it will even make you cooler!

WolfMan: I had no idea what to anticipate last night, and I still don’t entirely comprehend everything I saw, in a good way. There were a lot of elements that felt familiar from movies that I loved without it feeling like anything was lifted from another movie. What were your inspirations?

Dennis Widmyer: I’d definitely say Possesion by Zulawski. Kevin had seen it before I had and told me I needed to see it. He said it was a “horror film about divorce” and that was what made me interested to see it. Not the body horror, but the metaphor of something very real done in a horrific way. As writers, we like to explore psychological issues and character traits through a genre lens. We wanted to tell a story like this and we looked at movies like that for inspiration.

Kevin Kolsch: As far as you saying it didn’t feel like we ripped anything off, the thing is that you have influences that form the style of film that you might want to make, but as long as you’re telling a story or a character that’s coming from somewhere within you, you have something unique you want to say, it’ll make your movie stand apart from other genre films.

Travis Stevens: If you’re pushing to make it more original. You’re going to have influences, but you make it your own. We had a joke about “updating the occult”. Are we going to have dudes with torches or are we going to try to find something a little more original?

WM: And that’s what I enjoyed. It was a cult but you didn’t make it anything we had seen before. Alex, did you have any idea what you were in store for when you signed on for this movie?

Alex Essoe: I don’t know if I fully realized the gravity of what I would be doing, but I enjoyed it all the more for it. After reading the script, it was one of those “Alright, time to go balls out”, to use the parlance of our time.

WM: As the kids are saying.

AE: Balls all out in the breeze. It was nice because you so rarely get the opportunity as an actor to do that.

KK: You don’t get the opportunity to go balls out all that often? (laughs)

AE: Yeah, the balls normally have to stay in place and it’s no fun that way. No really, especially at this point in my career where I’m completely unknown, I get Girlfriend, Girl Next Door, Streetwalker, Model Number One.

WM: Well at least you’re number one. It didn’t hurt that you do look familiar to Jessica Harper that it helped with the Suspiria vibe.

DW: Oh yeah! I never noticed! You do kind of look like her.

AE: I’ll take that as a huge compliment. I love Jessica Harper. Phantom of the Paradise is one of my favorites. It’s so good.

Alex Essoe in Starry Eyes

WM: Phantom of the Paradise is very near and dear to my heart. I was talking to someone about Starry Eyes after the screening and I mentioned how there were themes of being a commentary on Hollywood and I took away from it that it was just the setting, and this person from L.A. said it was really heavy in those metaphors. Being an outsider of the industry, it was cool how I could take it more at face value and people from L.A. could dig deeper.

DW: That’s good though. We didn’t want to make a film like this where it was a Hollywood you had seen a hundred times. The person walking on Hollywood Boulevard and palm trees and the Hollywood sign all shiny. We wanted to make the town feel ominous, like a character that could crush you and crush your dreams. When you go to L.A. the first time, you think you’re going to see something like Pasadena or Santa Monica, but that’s not the L.A. where this film was really happening. L.A., where the studio was, was a more desolate, apocalyptic place most of the time.

TS: Reality-wise, you go there expecting something. Your dream is to move to L.A. and you say, “I’m gonna DO this!” and within a year you say, “This SUCKS!” Then all of a sudden, this town you rode into is a place you fucking hate.

AE: It doesn’t help that so many people in L.A. just want to discuss their resumes and throw their accomplishments in your face at every chance they get.

WM: Hey, you were just bragging about being Model Number One.

AE: It was pretty huge, I’m not gonna lie. Everybody wants to feel special and they think they can do that by wearing what they’ve done on their sleeve instead of just being cool people.

TS: That’s another thing that we tried to do. Everyone’s seen the story of the town that corrupts you. You can watch the movie that way and I think you go into it expecting that’s what the story is. This poor, innocent girl gets corrupted by these dark forces. Then three-quarters of the way through, you realize that’s not what’s going on.

AE: And that’s what I really liked about the character. It wasn’t all these things that just happened to her. It’s something she seeks out.

A bunch of Creeps in Starry Eyes

WM: Right off the bat, just from the title card alone, I thought “This is going to be fucking awesome.” That and the amazing music really helped nail the tone. Could you talk a little bit about the music?

KK: It seems like everyone I’ve been talking to really loved the music. When we had temp tracks in the movie, we had a variety of things. From classical composers to tracks from other movies. We didn’t have one cohesive voice throughout, which is very important. We knew that when it came down to the score that it wasn’t going to be something all over the map. We were going to have to pick one. We had to pick one style. Even when we were first considering music, I remember thinking if the 80’s synth thing through the entire movie would be too much. When we started getting back tracks, it was amazing how it was capturing that 80’s synth feel, paying homage to that, and at the same time it was still so modern and current and fit with what was going on in the movie.

AE: There was so much variety, too.

TS: See that’s another example of influences. It was a good starting point, but how do you make it fresh and original? When we started looking at composers, our poster designer Jaw Shaw said, “You know who should do this score? It should be THIS guy (Jonathan Snipes). I know him.”

DW: You and I were saying, “That’s interesting.” Then we started listening to his stuff and we dropped some of his tracks from Room 237 and right away it was like, oh fuck, seeing what could be done to the scene.

TS: And I don’t know about you, but for Room 237, you have this YouTube video of how he did the music and there’s this room of all these synths and cables everywhere. He collects antique synths from the 60’s and 70’s. He buys them on eBay. I’ve been in his studio. It’s loaded with equipment.

WM: And I’m glad you said “from the 80’s”, because I didn’t want to limit it to that.

DW: The instruments he’s using are from that era. They don’t sound like that anymore.

KK: And it’s easier to throw out “The 80’s”. It really started in the late 70’s, early 90’s.

WM: So you have synth from the 80’s and Alex’s character has pictures of actresses from classical Hollywood that most audience won’t recognize anymore and then the story is a contemporary setting. It ties it all together. You’ve created a timeless masterpiece is what I’m saying.

AE: We did it guys.

KK: It’s funny that you say that because that’s exactly what I was going for. I don’t know about you guys, but I set out to do it.

TS: We got it.

WM: The original title of the movie was “Timeless Masterpiece”. Going along with the cult stuff, it was unique stuff that we hadn’t seen before, so if there a background to this group or does this group have a future? Will we ever know more about them?

DW: Well, with Starry Eyes 2…Starrier Eyes. (laughs) We liked that they had this public face of the company and then on the other hand, there was more stuff behind the scenes. It would be interesting to see more of that world.

TS: The copyright actually lies with the production company.We thought that was a funny little wink. There were versions that went into it a little bit more, but like you said, we already know enough about them. Let’s focus on what’s important. Everyone gets the iconography, let’s stick with what’s interesting.

KK: And it’s interesting that you say that because it goes back to what we were talking about before. We see some familiar things, but it doesn’t feel like a copy. The familiar things, we use them to our advantage at times. You take things that people know or have seen, and it’s familiar to them so you don’t need to go explain something that’s not really the focus of the movie. We can spend time with her and her journey. There were versions where we spent more time explaining the cult or what their motives were, but we knew people would get it. What the cult was and what their motives were, so let’s focus on the heart of this character. Using the familiarities of the genre to really zero in on what we wanted to focus on.

WM: Were there any particular performances that inspired you? You were fantastic in the movie. Was there anything you had to use to get you in that frantic mindset?

AE: I was really inspired by Isabelle Adjani in Possession. Mostly because of her recklessness in that part, it was very inspiring. I watched that and I knew it was what was required. I needed to go full hilt like that. When we were doing the first audition scene, it was weird, we had been filming for a while at that point and you kind of get this momentum with a character that you’ve been wearing for a while. I was so anxious and I felt unhinged. Which of course is the character, it’s how she goes through life, constantly restraining herself. I had to go into my trailer and scream into a pillow for a while, and wouldn’t have been able to do it. My dad came to set that day. Out of all days, it was my big freakout scene.

DW: And he got emotional, right?

AE: Yeah, he teared up. It broke my heart. He was asking if I was okay and I said, “Yeah Dad, it’s just this thing.”

Alex Essoe in Starry Eyes

WM: You guys were making this movie in Hollywood and you said you connected with this character and what she was going through, so how similar were conditions on set with these guys as to what your character went through on the movie?

DW: We’re gonna get that question a lot.

AE: Completely…

WM: The same. Got it.

AE: Dennis and Kevin are wonderful to work with. They took excellent care of me.

TS: Notice she didn’t say anything about me.

AE: Travis was a rock. He really was. But specifically with the directing, their notes were always really great.

DW: We were always worried about you and checking in to see if you were okay.

AE: And I’d say, “I’m just acting”. Doing a little acting. They were really great to work with. Their vision was something I really connected with and respected. My goal, my main goal, was to honor their writing. Make it truthful. It’s all we can really do.

TS: When you’re doing something this dark and intense, you have to keep a fun, light, family vibe so that everybody feels safe.

AE: The crew was amazing, too. Everyone was so cohesive.

TS: We had cookies every day.

WM: Seriously? I ordered cookies during the movies last night. It was raining and I knew I deserved warm cookies. That’s awesome. We should all get snacks sometimes.

KK: And Travis and I would like to say we formed an Oreo addiction on set, but technically it was a “chocolate cookie sandwich” addiction on-set. We had Oreos on day one.

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Film Review: ‘Starry Eyes’

August 17, 2014 | 07:27PM PT

Alex Essoe gives a knockout performance as an aspiring actress who pays a serious price for stardom in this gory horror-thriller.

The oft-told tale of a struggling actress seeking her first big break gets a juicy new spin in the psychodrama/body-horror hybrid “Starry Eyes.” Featuring a knockout performance by Alex Essoe as a sweet young hopeful who transforms into a nasty, feral nutcase after selling much more than her soul to a shadowy production company, the pic pushes the Tinseltown nightmare scenario to inventive and exciting extremes. Though it’s a tad overcranked in the final furlong, the sheer energy on display and a devilishly compelling plot ultimately win the day. Presently touring the genre fest circuit, “Starry Eyes” looks like a difficult theatrical proposition but should be in high demand on streaming platforms.

Writing-directing duo Kevin Kolsch and Dennis Widmyer set their film in a “Day of the Locust”-like society of Hollywood fringe-dwellers whose dreams are never going to come true. The starry eyes in question belong to twentysomething Sarah Walker (Essoe), an instantly compelling mix of bubbly self-belief and debilitating insecurity who makes ends meet as a waitress at Hot Tatas, a fast-food joint of the Hooters variety. Stuck on the familiar actors’ treadmill of slogging it out in the service industry while waiting to be discovered by the entertainment business, the aspiring thesp has just one acting prospect: a movie planned by Danny (Noah Segan), a wannabe filmmaker who lives in his van and appears to have no realistic chance of turning talk into reality.

The game-changer is Sarah’s audition for “The Silver Scream,” a dark tale about Hollywood from Astraeus Pictures, a long-established company whose prominence has declined in recent years. Believing she’s flubbed the tryout, Sarah runs to the bathroom, where her pent-up frustration is released in an extraordinary series of primal screams and tortured facial expressions, accompanied by the tearing out of large clumps of hair. Having accidentally witnessed this scene, Astraeus’ unnamed and frighteningly humorless casting director (Maria Olsen) offers Sarah a second chance. “We’ll be in touch” has rarely sounded so creepy as when a similarly stone-faced and unnamed production assistant (Marc Senter, sounding uncannily like Crispin Glover) tells Sarah she’s in the running for the lead role.

The story slithers nicely toward its horror elements via the headquarters of Astraeus Pictures. Summoned to a meeting room that looks as if it hasn’t been redecorated since 1945, Sarah is offered the part, provided she performs sexual favors for the company’s unnamed boss (Louis Dezseran), a sleazy oldster with an overdone suntan and impossibly white teeth. Several days after rejecting these overtures, Sarah reconsiders and seals the deal in a dreamlike sequence that’s a bit short on information about the exact nature of the Astraeus cult, but leaves no doubt her destiny is now in the hands of satanic forces, or something very similar.

Cleverly reversing the traditional pattern of a Faustian pact, where rewards come first and heavy tolls are exacted later, Kolsch and Widmyer’s screenplay sends Sarah into severe physical and emotional decline. Starting with an assault on her Hot Tatas boss, Carl (Pat Healy, “Cheap Thrills”), and a falling out with her kind-hearted roommate Tracy (Amanda Fuller), Sarah’s downward spiral continues with radical hair loss and terrible facial blemishes that give her the appearance of the most badly strung-out junkie. Her condition gets much worse from there. Although the bloodbath that follows is gorier and more sadistic than is probably required, the filmmakers keep a firm grip on their underlying themes of transformation and reinvention en route to a highly satisfying climax.

In her first starring role, Essoe is outstanding as both the fragile Sarah and the subhuman psycho she becomes. Healy adds spark as the talkative fast-food boss, and Fabianne Therese is spot-on as Erin, a fellow acting hopeful and fake friend who ends up paying a hefty price for her thinly veiled desire to see Sarah fail. Gradually changing its color spectrum from bright and warm to dark and grungy, the pic is well served by lenser Adam Bricker and production designer Melisa Jusufi. Ranging from tinkly tunes of the ballerina-music-box type to driving ’80s-style synth-pop power chords, Jonathan Snipes’ excellent score nails the mood at every moment. All other tech credits are on the money.

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Juno Temple, interview: 'I'm not the high-school catch'

The actress Juno Temple has made her name playing quirky, troubled characters. Now she stars as a fairy in Maleficent. Stephanie Rafanelli meets her

Actress Juno Temple Photo: Amanda Friedman

She has played a 12-year-old Texan trailer trash girl whose virginity is offered as collateral to a hitman in Killer Joe; a stripper-cum-sex worker in Afternoon Delight; a lesbian lycanthrope in Jack and Diane; a schizophrenic insomniac in Magic Magic; and the murdered girlfriend of a man with Satanic powers, played by Daniel Radcliffe, in Horns out later this year. That’s more edgy, challenging roles than most actresses take on in a lifetime.

“I usually like to play a woman who’s got s--- going on,” she tells me. “I’m not sure I ooze leading lady, I’m not the high school catch. I’ve been lucky with characters, but some are real headf----.” She talks as if she’s on fast forward. “That’s why it’s so important to have a director you trust, who can bring your feet back to earth when you’re weeping in a hole after being beaten up.” She remembers Joe Wright reassuring her, when, at 16, she was left traumatised by the sexual abuse scene in Atonement: “Your character is f---ed up, but Juno’s okay.” She says now: “I’ve had to do a couple of rape scenes and they’re f---ing rough. There’s a brutal one in Horns, then I have to play dead. I’m not good at it because I have an overactive vein in my neck. It’s screaming: ‘I’m not ready to die yet!’”

^{Juno as Lola Quincey in Atonement}

Playing such intense roles back-to-back in the contracted shoots of low budget films can take its toll. She stopped sleeping during Magic, Magic, which, she says, helped with her character’s mental breakdown. And she has just wrapped Len & Company, about a record producer played by Rhys Ifans, in which she’s a pop star who overdoses. “I had some bad dreams with that one. I get very involved in my roles. I want people to think it’s all really happening. If I’m in it, I’m in it. At the end of an indie, you can feel like a wet rag that’s been wrung dry.”

Temple is willing to go, emotionally, where other actresses fear to tread to confront the unpalatable head on. But then, rebel spirit is in her DNA. Her father is Julien T...d director of the 1979 Sex Pistols documentary The Great Rock and Roll Swindle as well as videos for The Rolling Stones and The Kinks. His sister and Juno’s aunt is Nina Temple, the last secretary of the British Communist Party; while their father, Langdon, ran Progressive tours, a travel agency specialising in Communist countries. Temple and his wife, producer Amanda Pirie, instilled their daughter and her two younger brothers Leo, now 20, and Felix, 14, with a healthy disregard for convention; they hung out with The Clash’s Joe Strummer and family, and attended to Glastonbury festival regularly from an early age.

The children were encouraged to follow their own creative spirits. Their home, a 14th century house in Taunton, Somerset, was a playground for their imaginations. “As kids, we lived in this magical world and roamed free in the gardens. I was obsessed with Alice in Wonderland. My dad cut the hedges so that they started shorter and grew taller, so I could run up and down and feel like I was shrinking.” She still looks enthralled. “I was the kind of girl who’d peep through her bedroom keyhole to check if her dolls were moving.”

Her fascination with fairy tales was ignited when her father screened Jean Cocteau’s La belle et la bete and The Red Shoes for her as a little girl. She says she was always drawn to the tales’ darker characters.

^{Juno (centre) with her mother Amanda and father Julien}

“I was constantly in fancy dress and in character as a kid.” She cringes. “I would sometimes be a Russian refugee with a little doll begging for food. If my mother ruptured the fantasy and called me by my real name, I’d say. ‘But who is this Juno?’”

Her parents weren’t surprised when she said she wanted to become an actress. So her father cast her, at eight, in his film about French anarchist Jean Vigo (although he cut the scene) and Pandaemonium, two years later, about Wordsworth and Coleridge. It was enough to give Temple the pluck, at 12 years old, to attend the Notes on a Scandal audition and nail the role of Blanchett’s sulky teenage daughter.

By the time she left Bedales, the liberal arts boarding school she attended in Hampshire, Temple had worked on eleven films culminating in St Trinian’s 2: The Legend of Fratton’s Gold which she filmed during her A-levels. (She says that the film’s star Rupert Everett co-wrote the essay she did for her A Level drama coursework, for which she got a C+).

With a steady flow of parts since then, she never had time to go to drama school and moved to LA after school. This time has left its mark, on more than just her accent. She has learned to cope with the inevitable blows of rejection - “I still weep like child, when I don’t get a part I wanted. But it no longer feels like a teenage break-up” - and has recently conceded “the importance of downtime” to decompress from her roles. “If I’m having a bad day, I put on lingerie, a silk robe and fluffy pumps and walk around the house or bake something,” she giggles. “I’m just crazy about nice knickers.”

She lives in a 1920s bungalow filled with vintage clothes and British flags in Los Feliz, near Hollywood, with her boyfriend, actor Michael Angarano, whom she met on the set of 2012’s Brass Teapot. Temple has a playful, saucy spirit: she once collected Angarano from the airport in nothing but underwear, heels and a raincoat.

There’s a physicality to her behind the impishness. She has never shied away from sexual subjects or nudity in her work: in Killer Joe she stands full-frontal before Matthew McConaughey - and she learned to strip for Afternoon Delight. “Learning to lap dance was liberating. It made me more at ease with my body,” she tells me. “But we all have: ‘Am I smart or pretty enough?’ moments. I’m more comfortable about nudity when I’m playing someone else, but putting on a bathing suit at a pool party? That’s still intimidating.”

And we’re back on the subject of skimpy clothing. I can attest that Temple really is crazy about knickers. She spends hours sketching designs: her latest include a surrealist collection covered in lobsters and Dali-esque melting clocks.

If only there was more time. But alas, she has four films scheduled for next year including Sin City 2, an adaptation of Far from the Madding Crowd with Carey Mulligan and an HBO music special directed by Martin Scorsese and produced by Mick Jagger, who knows her father, though she doesn’t remember them hanging out: “I was too distracted by fairies in the garden,” she snorts.

All this whimsy has got me daydreaming now, about the kind of actress Temple will be, when she can no longer pass as a teen. Kate Winslet’s indie roles spring to mind, so does Helena-Bonham Carter in her Fight Club phase. “Will Juno Temple ever hit puberty?” she anticipates my question. “I think so. I really hope so...” She lets out an endearingly witchy cackle.

Maleficent is out on Blu-ray in November.

Lady Gaga Reveals Long-Awaited Cheek To Cheek Album Covers

Lady Gaga took to Twitter to announce the 2 different artworks for her upcoming album with Tony Bennett, “Cheek to Cheek”. Below you can see the album cover for the standard edition and deluxe edition.

Deluxe version.

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Bob Seger Returns With New Studio Album on October 14

Bob Seger has emerged from the studio equipped with a new album, Ride Out, set to be released October 14 on Capitol Records. The first single, “Detroit Made,” pays homage to America’s love affair with the automobile. The uptempo song hit radio airwaves this past weekend serving as the perfect backdrop to the 20th annual Woodward Dream Cruise, the world’s largest one day celebration of classic car culture.

“I feel really good about this record,” says Seger. “This album touches on how I think a lot of us feel about finding our place in a more complicated world – from how we appreciate things as simple and pure as love, to navigating through the corruption and violence that permeates the news. It sums up a lot of feelings I have about a variety of subjects.”

Produced by Seger, the new collection stays true to his legendary sound as he effortlessly marries rock, blues and country, yielding an album with all the hallmarks of the rocker’s deep catalog of hits. Seger began teasing tracks from the album during his 2013 tour, including “Detroit Made,” “All of The Roads” and “California Stars.”

Ride Out is Seger’s first studio album since his 2006 platinum-certified Face The Promise and follows his 2011 platinum-certified release, Ultimate Hits: Rock and Roll Never Forgets.

Bob Seger has sold more than 51 million albums and has racked up 13 platinum and 7 multi-platinum RIAA-certified album sales awards in the U.S. alone. He is both a Rock & Roll Hall of Fame and Songwriters Hall of Fame inductee, and his Greatest Hits, Against The Wind, Night Moves, Stranger In Town, Nine Tonight, and Live Bullet have been RIAA-certified for more than five million U.S. album sales each. The 1994 Greatest Hitscollection was the #1 best-selling catalog album in the U.S. during the past decade (2001-2009), as reported by Billboard/SoundScan. With his many successes, Seger’s music is permanently etched in the American musical landscape.

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Lucy Hale To Host The 2014 “MTV VMA Red Carpet” Airing Live On Sunday, August 24 At 8:00 P.M.

MTV today announced that rising country singer and actress Lucy Hale will host the hour-long 2014 “MTV VMA Red Carpet” pre-show LIVE alongside MTV’s own Sway and Christina Garibaldi on Sunday, August 24 at 8:00 p.m. ET/PT outside of The Forum in Inglewood, CA and leading into the VMAs live at 9:00 p.m. ET/PT. The telecast will feature live performances by chart-topping artists, Fifth Harmony and Charli XCX, presented by State Farm®. Leading up to the star-studded pre-show, MTV will air an all new episode of its hit scripted drama, “Teen Wolf,” beginning at 7:00 p.m. ET/PT.

“Hosting this year’s MTV VMA Red Carpet is the topper to a pretty great year for me after releasing my first album,” said Lucy Hale. “I’m looking forward to meeting and talking to some of my favorite artists. It’s going to be an amazing night!”

Lining the red carpet will be more than one thousand screaming fans creating a unique and interactive experience on-site and for viewers at home. Housed on massive bleachers, the fans will give the show a whole new energy with en masse audience participation. Also, for the first time ever, fans at home will have the chance to interact with celebrities during the pre-show via social media.

“I cannot wait to perform during the VMAs pre-show,” said Charli XCX. “And it’s so exciting to have a nomination not only for ‘Boom Clap’ but for other things with ‘Fancy.’ It’s a girl power anthem and the video is next level.”

“We couldn’t believe it when we were told that we get to perform on the VMA red carpet,” said Fifth Harmony’s Ally Brooke. “We’ve all grown up watching many of our favorite artists perform at the VMAs and now to not only be nominated for an award but also get to perform is phenomenal for us.”

Also during the pre-show, pop act and Inglewood’s own Becky G and YouTube star Ingrid Nilsen (Missglamorazzi)will report on all the night’s beauty trends while serving as conduits for the audience to experience the VMAs in real time through fan inspired challenges using #instaGLAM. Additionally, teen sensation Austin Mahone will be on hand fulfilling his #DareAustin challenge that had fans submitting their ideas for how he should arrive on the red carpet via social media.

As previously announced, “House of Style” host and VMA performer and nominee, Iggy Azalea, will be on hand to talk about her role with the return of the series. During the main show, “House of Style” special correspondent, Rita Ora, will bring fans live into the VMA action with real-time commentary on all things VMAs – from the performances to red carpet hair, notable fashions, and more.

In the episode of “Teen Wolf” that’s airing immediately prior to the pre-show, Scott (Tyler Posey) and Kira (Arden Cho) fight to protect Satomi’s pack from assassins and Stiles (Dylan O’Brien) and Malia (Shelley Hennig) discover the origins of The Dead Pool. The episode will re-air in its regularly scheduled timeslot on Monday, August 25 at 10:00 p.m. ET/PT, followed by an all-new “Wolf Watch.”

The 2014 “MTV Video Music Awards,” the loudest and at times, the most controversial, annual live celebration of music, is set to make its triumphant return to the west coast when it airs LIVE from the Forum in Inglewood, CA on Sunday, August 24th at 9pm ET/PT. BEYONCÉ leads the nominations this year with eight, followed by Emimen and Iggy Azalea with seven each. This year’s VMAs will feature not-to-miss performances from Nicki Minaj, Usher, Ariana Grande, 5 Seconds of Summer, Maroon 5, Iggy Azalea and BEYONCÉ, who will also receive the prestigious Michael Jackson Video Vanguard Award.

Ratings for the 2013 “MTV Video Music Awards Pre-Show” increased 100 percent compared to the previous year with P12-34 and garnered a 3.6 rating among that demographic, and total viewers grew a whopping 119 percent with 4.6 million tuning in.* Additionally, the 2013 “MTV Video Music Awards” aired across MTV’s global network of more than 60 channels and enjoyed a double-digit ratings increase year over year in key international markets such as the UK, Australia, the Netherlands, Singapore, Spain, Argentina and more.

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METALLICA At HEAVY MONTREAL: Official Footage Of Final Show Of 'By Request' Tour

August 18, 2014

METALLICA's official YouTube channel Metallica TV has been updated with fly-on-the-wall footage shot by a MetOnTour.com reporter on August 9 at the Heavy Montreal festival in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. The 15-minute clip includes footage of the band warming up in the tuning room, the pre-show huddle, and "Battery" and "The Four Horsemen" from the show.

The Heavy Montreal performance marked METALLICA's sole North American date on the "Metallica By Request" tour, which hit Europe and South America earlier in the year. The trek featured the band playing 17 songs requested online by fans in each city, with the final slot in the set list taken by a new song, "Lords Of Summer".

The band's setlist was as follows:

01. Blackened
02. Master Of Puppets
03. Welcome Home (Sanitarium)
04. Ride The Lightning
05. The Unforgiven
06. Lords Of Summer
07. ...And Justice For All
08. Sad But True
09. Fade To Black
10. Orion
11. One
12. For Whom The Bell Tolls
13. Battery
14. Nothing Else Matters
15. Enter Sandman

Encore:

16. Creeping Death

17. The Four Horsemen
18. Seek & Destroy

METALLICA drummer Lars Ulrich told Metal Hammer in a new interview that "Lords Of Summer" went over well with fans hearing it live on the band's "By Request" tour. Ulrich explained, "It's fun to play. It seems like the kids are enjoying it. There was actually somebody in the 'Snake Pit' the other day with a homemade 'Lords Of Summer' T-shirt on, which was very endearing."

Ulrich added, "It's a good song. Hey, listen, who knows by the time the next record comes out whether it will be in its same shape or format. But it's fun to play. And I think it's going down well, from what I can tell, from my little spot."

Ulrich said that in the past when the band has played fresh material live, sometimes the songs have not even had finished lyrics or titles. But he remarked that "Lords Of Summer" is "a little further along in terms of it being, sort of, together, so we're quite comfortable playing it. It's kind of written for this tour."

The drummer recently told "Metal Zone" about the band's next record, "I'm pretty convinced that 90 percent of the record is actually written, it's just gotta be kind of assembled between all those riffs. It's just a matter of connecting this to this and sort of shaping it into a song."

Frontman James Hetfield said something very similar when The Pulse Of Radio asked him a while back about the status of the band's new material. "We've come up with enough material for a record, for sure," he said. "We've gone through maybe one-tenth of the material that's on our riff CDs, but we've got enough for an album. We just haven't had the time to really focus on it and dial in and start whittling at these masterpieces, hopefully."

Kat Edmonson To Release '... Announced

Posted by Navi 07Aug

Kat Edmonson announces October tour dates in support of her third album, "The Big Picture," out September 30 via Sony Music Masterworks.

A full tour will follow in early 2015. Edmonson's premiere track "Rainy Day Woman" is available via iTunes HERE and for streaming on SoundCloud HERE. Check out her new video album trailer HERE. The album is her label debut and was recorded with Grammy-nominated producer Mitchell Froom (Paul McCartney) in his Los Angeles studio. Of the album, Edmonson states, "There's no particular theme, but there are some commonalities, one of which is my ever-underlying influence from motion pictures and film scores. I have always felt that music and film go hand in hand, because that was how I was first exposed to music—from old movies and musicals—and to me there wasn't a separation between an actor acting, dancing and singing." Presale tickets are available now while general ticketing is available is August 8 at katedmonson.com. See full tour dates below.

This album follows her 2012 release, "Way Down Low," her first collection that included original material. The New York Times hailed the album as "fresh as a spring bouquet," and The Boston Globe called it "one of the greatest vocal albums I've ever heard."

The record debuted at #1 on the Billboard Heatseekers Albums Chart and was featured on several major year-end "Best of 2012" lists including Downbeat Magazine, WNYC Soundcheck's
"Best Live Performances" and Daytrotter's "Best Sessions of 2012."

Edmonson performed on Austin City Limits made her Prairie Home Companion debut, and was featured on NPR an impressive five times that same year. The songstress also found herself touring with several well-established acts such as Chris Isaak, Gary Clark Jr. and Michael Kiwanuka.

Texas native Edmonson grew up in Houston and sang in the local club scene in Austin for several years before self-releasing Take To The Sky in 2009. A musical kinship developed from performing with fellow Texan Lyle Lovett led to a high-profile duet of the Christmas classic "Baby, It's Cold Outside," which the pair performed together on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno.

Sony Music Masterworks comprises Masterworks, Sony Classical, OKeh, Portrait, Masterworks Broadway and Flying Buddha imprints. For email updates and information please visit www.SonyMasterworks.com.

THE BIG PICTURE TRACK LISTING

1. Rainy Day Woman
2. You Said Enough
3. Oh My Love
4. Avion
5. Crying
6. All The Way
7. You Can't Break My Heart
8. Till We Start To Kiss
9. The Best
10. Dark Cloud
11. For Two
12. Who's Counting

KAT EDMONSON TOUR DATES

October 7
Philadelphia, PA
World Cafe Live

October 8
Boston, MA
Regatta Bar @ The Charles Hotel

October 11
Toronto, ON
The Drake

October 12
Morgantown, WV
Mountain Stage

October 14
Chicago, IL
City Winery

October 16
Minneapolis, MN
Dakota Jazz

October 19
Vancouver, BC
Rio Theatre

October 20
Portland, OR
Alberta Rose Theater

October 22
San Francisco, CA
Great American Music Hall

October 23
Los Angeles, CA
Masonic Lodge

- See more at: http://emptylighthouse.co...ZGQe5.dpuf

Kat Edmonson Exclusive Interview

by Helen Earnshaw | 26 June 2013

Kat Edmonson is back with her new album Way Down Love as releases her first record with a label.

We caught up with the singer/songwriter to chat about the new album, how it has been received and what lies ahead.

- You are about to release your new album Way Down Low so what can fans expect from this new collection of tracks?

It is a very… I don’t know how to answer that question as I don’t feel comfortable about my music in a descriptive way (laughs). It’s a minimalistic and very romantic album about deep love.

- That leads me into my next question as this album is very instrumental and there is no heavy production as it is all quite natural how conscious a decision was it going for that kind of sound?

It was but only because this is how I had been performing at that point and so it was very much a photograph of what I have been doing at that time.

We recorded live, which is a much different experience than coming over a long period of time and over-dubbing various tracks. It is really fun and is more akin to performing live on stage because you only have so much time to present what is being recorded; which is a bit nerve-wracking.

We recorded over two days and so we had a very limited amount of time. Each song we had two and at the most three takes and we would play them all the way through and then choose our favourite take of each; that was an exciting process in itself.

- I was wondering how much you enjoyed that as an artist as it is almost like performing live on stage as you say?

I love it, I don’t know if I could completely give that up. Even though I interstate on the next record overdubbing and more instruments and having a bit more production on the album I really can’t stray from playing live with the musicians.

I don’t sing very well to a track and it is almost necessary that I sing with the players playing.

- You also recorded at the Avatar Studios and The Capitol Studios - which a re rich with music history - so how did you find that?

Wow, it was just a dream come true. Capitol was amazing - I actually mixed my first album Take To The Sky there which I released on my own in the States.

Once I had been there it really was a goal to go back as often as I could; it really one of my favourite places to be because of all of the music history.

It is a beautiful building in itself and the energy there is very palpable and it feels like legends have been there.

And Avatar is a top of the mark facility. I just feel so privileged to be able to use such places, it really was an honour.

- Your debut album was self funded and this one has been funded using Kickstarter so how difficult has it been without the financial input of a label to get two albums up and running, recorded and released?

It is very difficult. Fortunately because I have such a supportive fan base it was perhaps less difficult that it might be for some.

I was able to raise $50,000 within a month - I would say effortlessly because it was very much a campaign to spread the word each day and encourage people to get on board with me but we they came through, and very willingly.

As difficult as it may have been it was actually very rewarding and it creating a strength in the relationship with my fan base.

- It does allow you to connect with your fans in a way that perhaps you haven’t before because they almost feel that they have had to the record. So how have you found the reaction from them?

Exactly. It has been really wonderful and it has only made them more supportive. And in turn I have learnt more about them; I have learnt what they like, what they care about, what they are interested and there are all things that are invaluable to me.

- There are still a couple of weeks to the album but have you been able to engage any early responses? And how has the album been received in the States?

Very well. It reached number one on the Billboard Heatseekers chart twice and with essential no machine from the start publicising the album.

In the first week of release it went to number on the Billboard Heatseekers chart. It was as good as I could have expected - it was wonderful.

- This album sees you make your song-writing debut so have you been writing for a while or is it pretty new to your? How did you find the whole experience?

I have been writing since I was a little girl - I think about eight or nine years old. I never had any music training or education really; it was just something that I did in the privacy of my room growing up. I didn’t really share it with many people.

I didn’t actually know if what I had was something legitimate - they seemed liked very real songs to me but I was nervous to share them. I didn’t actually know how to produce them.

They were there in my but because I didn’t play an instrument trying to convey that to a musician just seemed like an ocean to cross.

But once I gave it a try and learnt various ways of going about it and also leaned how to choose the chords myself the piano. It was a tedious process but it was very empowering and little by little I grew more courage to go ahead and released my own work.

- You are also having a hand in the production for the first time so how important was it to be involved in that side of making an album?

It is very important to me because upon writing a song I usually hear arrangements and instrumentation and it is hard to let those particular sounds go.

I see them through as best as I can not being an arranger and a player myself.

- Al Schmitt was also on board as producer and engineer so how did that collaboration come about?

He mixed my first record and we formed a very strong friendship. He was interested in working on the next record but he wanted to record it as well.

I was producing it myself along with my bass player and we welcomed any input from Al - which turned out to be quite a bit. It just very naturally came about that he was one of the producers.

- You are going to be playing at Bush Hall in July so how excited are you to get in front of a British crowd and introduce then to these tracks?

Really excited. I have come so far now in the United States and now I am jumping though to the UK and other parts of Europe and I am completely new again. But it is really fun and I can’t wait to see who I meet and I can’t wait to perform.

-How are you finding the response from UK crowds to your music - it does seem to be going down well?

I think so, yes. I haven’t had a lot of direct interaction but we did come and play a show at Old St Pancreas Church last month and that went very well, it was beautiful.

- So where did your love of music start and is this the career that you always envisioned for yourself?

It is. For me it was really a matter of time. Ten years ago I recall sitting my myself wondering how I would ever get here as I didn’t know anyone in music and I was just working a regular day job.

I had no idea of the ‘how’ but I knew what I wanted from a very young age; I think I knew that by about six years old. I remember a musical Singin’ In The Rain and looking at myself in the mirror afterwards and considering myself one of the people that I was watching on the screen - I just didn’t know how that was going to come about.

But I learnt music through old movies and movie scores and soundtracks - many of the songs that were written for the old movies actually what became what is known as The Great American Songbook.

But my passion has expanded well beyond that as I listen to oldies, country, classical and a lot of pop and rock as I got older.

- Finally what is next for you in the second half of this year?

I am just touring a lot and this is what I have to look forward to as I am going to a lot of new places that I have never been and a lot of faces that I have never seen before.

The third album is very much in the works - I don’t have an exact release date now - but I would say in about a year my focus will be shifting over there.

Fetching Prince Cover: